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^MERIC^N    ORATORS    ^ND 
REFORMERS. 


HORACE  GREELEY, 


THE  EDITOR, 


BY 

FRANCIS   NICOLL   ZABRISKIE. 


FUNK  &  WAGNALLS. 

NEW  YORK :  LONDON : 

i8  &  20  AsTOR  Place.      ■^   9^  44  Fleet  Street. 

All  Rights  Reserved. 
PRINTED  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES. 


Entered,  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1890,  by 

FUNK  &  WAGNALLS, 

In  the  Office  of  the  Librarian  of  Congress  at  Washington,  D.  C. 


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PREFATORY    NOTE. 


This  volume,  while  the  most  complete,  does 
not  pretend  to  be  an  exhaustive  account  of 
Horace  Greeley,  nor  of  the  times  and  the 
"  causes"  with  which  he  was  identified,  and 
in  some  of  them  a  magria  pars.  It  undertakes, 
however,  to  give  a  condensed,  unified,  and 
popular  presentation  of  the  man,  and  what  he 
stood  for  in  the  thick  of  days  which  made  his- 
^  tory  rapidly,  and  saw  our  young  Republic 
change  from  the  gristle  of  its  aspiring  and  rest- 
less youth  into  its  settled  and  not  unscarred 
maturity. 

My  chief  material  and  authority  have  been 
Mr.  Greeley's  own  "  Recollections  of  a  Busy 
Life,"  published  in  1868.  Mr.  James  Parton's 
delightful  omnium  gatherum  of  Greeleyana,  pub- 
lished in  1855,  is,  of  course,  a  mine  of  wealth, 
especially  valuable  as  being  written  under  the 
eye  and  doubtless  with  the  concurrence  of  Mr. 
Greeley  himself,  as  St.  Peter  is  credited  with 
the  supervision  or  approval  of  his  disciple 
Mark's  gospel.     Besides  these^  I  have  availed 


iv  PREFATORY   NOTE. 

myself  of  various  sketches  and  estimates  which 
have  appeared  from  time  to  time  in  the  period- 
ical press,  especially  at  the  time  of  his  death, 
from  those  whose  information  and  judgment 
made  their  words  of  the  highest  authority.  I 
have  consulted  also  letters  which  have  been 
since  collected,  have  availed  myself  of  personal 
recollections  by  mutual  friends,  and  drawn  upon 
a  lifetime  of  familiarity  (though  not  of  private 
acquaintance  with  himself)  with  the  sayings 
and  doings  of  perhaps  the  most  incessantly  ac- 
tive and  conspicuous  of  Americans  and  New 
Yorkers  for  a  generation.  And,  lastly,  I  have 
made  good  use  of  several  works  on  the  history 
and  characteristics  of  American  journah'sm.  I 
wish  to  make  special  acknowledgment  of  the 
courtesy  and  kindness,  in  these  researches,  of 
the  Librarians  of  the  College  of  New  Jersey, 
and  of  the  Theological  Seminary  of  Princeton. 

Princeton,  N.  J.,  October  12th,  1S89. 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER    I.  PACK 

The  Hour  and  the  Man 9 

CHAPTER   II. 
Early  Days 22 

CHAPTER   III. 
Training  and  Tramping 35 

CHAPTER   IV. 
Attempts  at  Life 50 

CHAPTER   V. 
Incipient  Journalism 61 

CHAPTER   VL 
The  Tribune 76 

CHAPTER   VII. 
The  Tribune  {Continued) 93 

CHAPTER   VIII. 
The  Editor iii 


vi  CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER    IX.  i-ACB 

Orator  and  Aithor 132 

CHAPTER  X. 
The  Reformer 148 

CHAPTER   XI. 
The  Reformer  {Continued) 166 

CHAPTER   XH. 
The  Politician  :  As  a  Whig 186 

CHAPTER    XHI. 
The  Politician:  The  Free-Soil  Struggle 205 

CHAPTER   XIV. 
The  Politician:  With  the  Republican  Party 224 

CHAPTER    XV. 
The  Politician  :  The  Civil  War 239 

CHAPTER   XVI. 
The  Politician  :  Reconstruction 258 

CHAPTER    XVII. 
The  Candidate  for  Office 271 

CHAPTER    XVIII. 
The  Closing  Scenes 291 


CONTENTS.  Vll 

CHAPTER   XIX.  PACE 

Home  Life  and  Travel 299 

CHAPTER   XX. 
Friends  and  Co-Laborers 319 

CHAPTER   XXL 
Personal  Characteristics 344 

CHAPTER   XXn. 
Rf suM:fe  AND  Estimate 367 


^ 


e«»! 


i7^ 


HORACE   GREELEY, 


CHAPTER    I. 

THE   HOUR  AND   THE   MAN. 

The  public  career  of  Horace  Greeley  exact- 
ly spans  what  may  be  called  the  era  of  transi- 
tion and  development  in  our  country's  history. 
By  his  public  career  we  understand  the  period 
from  his  beginnings  as  editor  in  New  York,  in 
1833,  to  his  death,  in  1872. 

When,  on  January  ist  of  the  former  year, 
he  made  his  first  journalistic  venture  in  the 
abortive  attempt  to  establish  a  penny  news- 
paper, the  first  break  was  made  in  the  tradi- 
tional and  almost  sacred  idea  of  a  journal  as  a 
slow,  costly,  and  unwieldy  vehicle  of  informa- 
tion. Up  to  that  time  the  **  blanket"  or  folio 
sheet,  with  its  meagre  news  and  occasional 
heavy  essay  by  way  of  editorial,  and  its  adver- 
tisements addressed  to  the  wants  of  the  larger 
dealers  of  the  business  community,  distributed 
almost  wholly  to  subscribers,  and  sold  only 
over  the  counter  and  in  business  quarters  at 


lO  HORACE    GKKELEV. 

the  price  of  sixpence,  was  the  type  of  a  New 
York  journal.  Those  who  are  familiar  with 
the  Journal  of  Commerce  of  to-day,  or  the 
Courier  and  Enquirer  of  a  generation  ago,  will 
realize  what  we  mean.  The  little  one-cent 
Morning  Post,  though  it  soon  set  beneath  the 
horizon,  was  the  morning  star  of  the  Sun,  the 
Herald,  the  Tribune,  the  Times,  and  the  World, 
— all  of  which  were  not  only  cheap  (beginning, 
at  least,  as  penny  papers),  but  were  of  manage- 
able size,  quivering  with  enterprise,  abounding 
in  brief  editorials,  and  crowded  with  readable 
matter  for  the  million.  This  process  of  jour- 
nalistic development  has  been  one  of  the  most 
striking  signs  and  achievements  of  the  times, 
and  has  done  more  than  almost  any  other 
agency  to  evolve  and  shape  the  America  of  to- 
day. 

It  was  no  less  of  an  era,  which  was  now  to 
open,  in  the  establishment  of  what  is  known  as 
the  independent  press.  By  this  we  do  not 
mean  a  neutral  or  even  non-partisan  press,  but 
one  which  was  not  dependent  for  its  support 
upon  the  subsidies  of  political  cliques  and  par- 
ties. It  had  been  taken  for  granted  that  no 
paper  could  be  established  or  supported  except 
as  a  party  organ,  absolutely  controlled  by  the 
political  powers  in  return  for  Government 
patronage,   or  opposition  funds.     The  editor, 


THE   HOUR  AND   THE   MAN.  II 

therefore,  was  virtually  owned,  as  well  as  the 
paper  virtually  mortgaged  ;  he  was  placed  there 
to  take  care  of  the  interests  of  a  party,  a  com- 
mittee, or  a  candidate.  A  high  authority  has 
said  :  "  There  was  no  such  thing  as  an  inde- 
pendent paper  in  those  days.  The  editors  were 
simply  party  hacks,  and  not  journalists.  The 
Washington  Globe,  the  Richmond  Enquirer^ 
the  Albany  Argtis,  were  the  '  thunderers, '  but 
the  Richmond  Junta,  the  Ritchie  Cabinet,  and 
the  Albany  Regency  furnished  the  lightning. 
From  a  few  *  organs  '  like  these  the  smaller 
papers  took  their  cue,  and  followed  suit  to  their 
lead."  This  state  of  things  was  strikingly  ex- 
posed by  Mackenzie's  publication,  in  pamphlet 
form,  of  a  once  famous  correspondence  found 
in  the  New  York  Custom  House,  involving  the 
political  intrigues  of  the  Democratic  leaders  of 
New  York,  the  Albany  Regency,  for  secur- 
ing the  support  of  the  Courier  and  Enquirer j  as 
well  as  the  candid  and  business-like  appeals  of 
James  Gordon  Bennett  for  the  pecuniary  as- 
sistance of  the  State  Committee  in  establishing 
the  Globe,  and  afterward  the  Pennsylva7tian. 

The  rebuffs  which  Bennett  met  with  opened 
his  eyes  to  the  fact  that  the  time  was  ripe  for 
a  new  departure.  The  people  had  become 
distrustful  of  a  hireling  press  and  an  automaton 
editorship,  and  the  very  party  leaders  and  can- 
didates were  beginning  to  find  more  harm  than 


12  HORACE   GREELEY. 

benefit  from  this  system.  If,  as  Mr.  Jesse 
Hoyt  said,  "recent  developments  have  had 
a  tendenc}-  to  satisfy  the  people  that  its  con- 
ductors, or  many  of  them  at  least,  are  as  ne- 
gotiable as  a  promissory  note,"  it  was  not  won- 
derful that  "  the  press  has  lost  some  portion  of 
its  hold  upon  public  confidence. 

It  was  then  that  Bennett's  discoven.'  took 
place  of  **  the  holiow-heartedness  and  humbug- 
geiy  of  these  political  associations  and  political 
men  ;"  and,  **  flinging  himself  loose  from  the 
slough,"  he  regained  his  liberty  and  indepen- 
dence completely.  The  Herald  appeared  on 
May  6th,  1S35,  and  its  immediate  success 
proved  the  truth  of  his  diagnosis  of  the  public 
mind,  and  effectually  broke  the  spell  of  a  slav- 
ish and  purchased  journalism.  Six  years  were 
still  to  elapse  before  Horace  Greeley  was  to 
burst  the  cjrcs  v.-i:h  which  his  }.'0ung  hands 
were  tied,  and  ess:.;.-  the  stii.  more  adventurous 
course  of  ar.  :r.  dependent  pB.rty  paper  ;  but  he 
had  cor.vir.cti  h:;^".?eh'  by  the  twofold  experi- 
ment of  a  ':.'.:- i  ::j::  ar.i  of  an  attempted  po- 
litical neut:-h:y.  that  his  time  had  come  to 
join  the  nev^^  rc'gimc. 

Doubtless  much  of  the  success,  both  of  the 
cheaper  and  of  the  independent  press,  was  due 
to  the  contemporan,"  and  rapid  increase  of 
facilities  for  circulating  newspapers  and  for  ob- 
taining news.     When  the  Sim  was  issued,  in 


THE   HOUR  AND   THE   MAN.  1 3 

1833,  there  were  only  two  short  railroads  in 
the  United  States,  one  from  Albany  to 
Schenectady,  and  the  other  from  Charleston 
to  a  point  on  the  Savannah  River.  There 
were  few  steamboats,  and  those  comparatively 
slow  and  infrequent.  Papers  had  mostly  to  be 
distributed  by  stage-coaches  and  post-riders — 
these  last  being  the  pioneers  even  of  the  mail 
routes,  and  riding  at  intervals  of  a  week  or  a 
fortnight.  But  the  opening  of  more  speedy 
transit  went  on  rapidly  from  this  date.  The 
Albany  and  Schenectady  Railroad  was  extended 
to  Utica  the  next  year.  In  1835  Boston  shot 
out  roads  to  Lowell,  Providence,  and  Worces- 
ter ;  within  three  or  four  years  these  two  latter 
were  extended  to  Stonington  and  to  Springfield. 
In  1837  the  Baltimore  and  Wilmington  began 
the  line  of  connection  between  the  national 
capital  and  the  Northern  cities.  In  1840  there 
were  nearly  four  million  miles  of  mail  route  by 
railroads  and  steamboats  ;  in  1859  ^^^  number 
of  miles  had  grown  to  nearly  thirty-two  millions. 
It  was  not  till  1838  that  steam  navigation 
was  established  between  this  country  and 
Europe,  the  first  trip  of  the  Sirius  and  the 
Great  Western  taking  fifteen  days  to  cross  the 
ocean.  The  foreign  mails  were  even  then  re- 
ceived only  once  a  fortnight  ;  previously  they 
had  been  dependent  on  wind  and  weather. 
Even  by  the  fast  steamboats  of  the  Hudson, 


14  HORACE   GREELEY. 

SO  late  as  1844,  it  was  sometimes  a  week  before 
the  election  returns  were  sufficiently  received 
to  determine  the  result  in  the  State  of  New 
York.  The  magical  era  of  the  telegraph  was 
not  far  in  the  future — Morse  completing  his 
line  between  Washington  and  Baltimore  on 
May  27th,  1844.  Submarine  telegraphs  began 
to  be  successfully  worked  under  various  rivers 
and  bays  even  earlier;  in  185 1  cables  were 
laid  between  Calais  and  Dover,  and  in  August, 
1858,  the  Atlantic  cable  united  Europe  and 
America.  It  was  on  the  threshold  of  this  stir- 
ring and  marvellous  period  of  development  that 
the  subject  of  our  biography  was  privileged  to 
begin  his  editorial  career,  and  to  keep  pace 
with  it  in  the  evolution  of  American  journalism. 

Our  country  was  still  in  its  callow  but  inquir- 
ing youth.  The  people,  from  the  circum- 
stances of  their  early  immigration,  their  ad- 
venturous struggles  to  establish  themselves  in 
a  vast  wilderness  secluded  from  the  Old  World, 
their  successful  emancipation  from  the  mother 
country,  their  national  organization  under  un- 
tried conditions,  were  naturally  disposed  to  pay 
none  too  great  respect  to  precedent,  and  to 
consider  all  the  facts  and  relations  of  life  sub- 
ject to  a  new  investigation  and  to  an  ofttimes 
crude  and  rash  experimenting.  These  experi- 
ments and  speculations  included  the  food  that 


THE   HOUR  AND   THE    MAN.  1 5 

was  eaten,  the  liquor  that  was  drunk,  the  rela- 
tions o£  the  sexes,  the  question  of  master  and 
servant,  the  whole  fabric  of  society,  the  funda- 
mental doctrines,  and  even  the  essential  truth, 
of  Christianity  itself.  All  the  circumstances 
of  birth  and  training  and  early  experience  were 
such  as  to  make  Horace  Greeley's  development 
almost  a  parallel  with  that  of  the  country,  and 
to  constitute  him  in  the  truest  sense  a  "  Young 
America."  And  accordingly  we  are  not  sur- 
prised to  find  him  nibbling  successively  at 
nearly  every  tentative  reform,  and  embracing 
zealously  and  with  constancy  two  or  three  of 
them  ;  above  all,  making  their  free  exposition 
and  discussion  the  most  distinctive  feature  of 
his  paper.  This  hospitality  to  recent  or  ec- 
centric thought  arose  not  more  from  sympathy 
than  from  a  genuine  journalistic  instinct,  which 
was  intent  upon  the  widest  publication  of  the 
newest  ideas  as  of  the  newest  facts. 

The  period  of  Horace  Greeley's  dfout  in 
editorial  life  was  also  synchronous  with  the 
opening  up  of  a  new  departure  in  American 
politics.  The  great  name  of  Washington  alone 
sufficed  to  maintain  the  Federal  Party  in  power 
for  a  single  Presidential  term  after  his  retire- 
ment, or  to  even  preserve  it  in  existence  for  a 
generation.  When  James  Monroe  was  re- 
elected to  the  Presidency,  in  1820,  with  a  single 


1 6  HORACE   GREELEY. 

dissenting  electoral  vote,  there  was  only  one 
party  in  the  United  States.  But  this  famous 
era  of  good  feeling,  so  placid  on  the  surface, 
was  a  boiling  caldron  of  intrigues,  ambitions, 
and  jealousies  between  rival  chieftains  and 
their  factions,  underneath.  The  partisans  of 
Adams,  Jackson,  Crawford,  Clay,  and  Calhoun 
were  about  to  play  the  role  of  Alexander's 
successors  in  dividing  up  the  imperial  political 
legacy  of  the  Republican  Party.  The  result  of 
the  election  of  John  Quincy  Adams  by  the 
House  of  Representatives,  in  1825,  through  a 
combination  of  his  forces  with  those  of  Henry 
Clay,  intensified  and  embittered  the  strife, 
though  no  attempt  was  made  during  his  ad- 
ministration to  create  a  distinct  party.  Poli- 
tics consisted  for  several  years  in  the  personal 
issue  of  Jackson  and  anti-Jackson. 

But  President  Jackson's  second  election,  in 
1832,  found  an  opposition  party  arrayed  under 
the  leadership  of  Henry  Clay,  calling  themselves 
Whigs,  and  with  a  platform  that  took  issue  with 
the  Democratic  creed  which  the  political  genius 
of  Martin  Van  Buren  had  formulated,  as  it  had 
also  completely  organized  the  party  itself.  It 
was  during  this  second  term  that  the  battle 
was  fully  joined  between  the  two  great  forces, 
upon  such  economic  issues  as  the  Tariff,  the 
National  Bank,  Internal  Improvements,  and 
the  Public  Lands,  which  constituted  the  polit- 


THE    HOUR   AND   THE   MAN.  I) 

ical  tenets  of  the  Whigs  for  the  years  dur- 
ing which  they  were  able  to  resist  the  re- 
morseless progress  within  their  ranks  of  the 
divisive  and  dynamitic  slavery  question.  The 
training  and  the  tendencies  of  Horace  Gree- 
ley, and  particularly  his  intense  admiration  of 
*'  Harry"  Clay,  drew  him  irresistibly  into  the 
Whig  Party,  to  whose  championship  he  devoted 
the  earliest  efforts  of  his  editorial  pen  at  the 
critical  hour  when,  in  183$,  the  battle  was 
rolling  up  to  defeat  the  election  of  Martin  Van 
Buren  as  tlie  successor  of  Andrew  Jackson. 

The  founders  of  this  Republic,  in  their  anxiety 
to  obtain  the  consent  of  all  sections  to  the 
Constitution  and  the  Union,  were  fain  to  ad- 
mit a  compromise  upon  one  point,  which  they 
little  realized  would  prove  an  agonizing  and 
almost  deadly  gall-stone  in  the  very  vitals  of 
the  country.  It  would  have  suited  the  great 
majority  of  the  convention.  North  and  South, 
not  to  recognize  the  existence  of  American 
slavery,  and  to  prohibit  at  once  the  African 
slave-trade.  But  the  extreme  Southern  States, 
South  Carolina  and  Georgia,  took  such  a  de- 
termined stand,  that  it  was  deemed  necessary 
to  exempt  the  slave-trade  from  interference  for 
twenty  years,  to  recognize  the  slaves  as  a  basis 
of  political  power  and  apportionment,  and  to 
provide    for  the    return   of   fugitives   to   their 


1 8  HORACE   GREELEY. 

masters  by  the  Federal  authority.  Some  of 
the  Southern  States  only  consented  to  ratify 
the  Constitution  upon  the  condition  that  no 
regulation  of  Congress  should  tend  to  the 
emancipation  of  slaves,  and  that  the  ordinance 
of  1787,  prohibiting  slavery  in  the  North- 
western Territory,  should  not  be  extended  to 
the  Southwestern  Territory,  or  to  the  admis- 
sion of  Southern  States.  This  question  of  ad- 
mitting slave  States,  however,  could  not  be 
suppressed  on  the  application  of  Missouri,  in 
1818  ;  and  after  a  struggle  of  two  years  another 
compromise,  admitting  Missouri  without  re- 
striction, but  excluding  slavery  forever  from 
all  territory  north  and  west  of  its  southern 
boundary. 

From  this  time  till  1835  (mark  the  date,  in 
connection  with  the  career  of  our  hero)  the 
subject  of  slavery  was  a  very  insignificant  factor 
in  the  politics  of  the  nation,  and  there  was  a 
general  consent  to  acquiesce  in  the  status  quo 
as  a  final  settlement.  Here  and  there  the  con- 
science of  a  Lundy  or  a  Garrison  would  not  let 
him  rest,  and  abolition  societies  kept  the  sub- 
ject from  being  forgotten.  There  was  even  a 
show  of  organization,  which  escaped  much 
tribulation  only  because  it  was  regarded  as  too 
insignificant  to  be  persecuted.  The  anti-sla- 
very feeling  of  the  North  chiefly  embodied  it- 
self in   the  mild    and   equivocal   form   of  the 


THE   HOUR   AND   THE   MAN.  I9 

Colonization  movement.  Up  to  this  time  even 
Horace  Greeley  held  sentiments  of  a  thorough- 
ly conservative  kind,  having  little  sympathy 
and  less  connection  with  the  agitators,  and 
deprecating  a  third  party  as  calculated  to 
weaken  the  Whigs,  whom  he  regarded  as  the 
only  effective  resistance  to  the  aggressions  of 
the  slave  power. 

These  aggressions,  however,  were  now  tak- 
ing shapes  which  could  no  longer  be  ignored, 
and  which  startled  him,  together  with  a  large 
portion  of  the  Northern  people,  into  a  moral 
and  political  sensitiveness  that  was  to  be  the 
turn  of   the  tide  in  the  rapid  development  of 
our  history.     One  of  these  was  the  assassina- 
tion of  Owen   Lovejoy,  a  Congregational  min- 
ister and  editor  in  Alton,  111.,  byamob,  which 
had  already  driven  him  out  of  Missouri.     This 
hounding  down  and  murder   of  a  man  for  his 
anti-slavery  teachings  in  a  free    State   awoke 
multitudes  to   a  realization,  that  there  could 
be  no  terms  on  which  a  free  and  a  slave-hold- 
ing people  could  get  on  together,  except  the 
virtual  enslavement  of  the  latter.     Just  at  this 
time,  also,  opened  the  f^rst  scene  of  the  great 
Texas  drama  by  the  invasion  of  that  Mexican 
province  by  "  Sam"  Houston,  with  the  slight- 
ly  disguised  intent  of  seizing  and  annexing  it 
as   an   enlargement   of    the  area  of  the   slave 
po.ver,— all    of   which    resulted,    according  to 


20  HORACE   GREELEY. 

arrangement,  in  a  rapid  series  of  like  move- 
ments in  less  than  a  dozen  years.  At  least,  in 
this  predetermined  light  did  the  awakened  and 
prophetic  eye  of  young  Greeley  regard  them. 
And  henceforth  he  took  his  place  as  one  of  the 
foremost,  and  probably  the  most  effective,  an- 
tagonists of  the  great  aggression,  which — over 
the  wreck  of  the  Missouri  Compromise,  and 
through  its  defeat  in  the  Kansas-Nebraska 
struggle — organized  against  itself  first  a  po- 
litical and  then  an  armed  resistance,  under 
whose  blows  the  serpent's  head  was  forever 
crushed.  Of  the  subsequent  history  of  recon- 
struction and  reconciliation,  we  need  only  say 
here  that  Mr.  Greeley's  part  was  probably  the 
most  conspicuous  of  any  American,  and,  not- 
withstanding his  personal  mistakes  and  failures, 
was  probably  the  most  effective  in  healing  the 
gaping  wounds  of  Civil  War — a  service  of  which 
he  may  justly  be  regarded  alike  as  the  pioneer 
and  the  martyr. 

It  is,  therefore,  no  exaggeration  to  say  that 
the  career  of  Horace  Greeley  not  only  marks  a 
new  epoch  in  the  journalism  of  this  country, 
but  that  "he  presents  an  extraordinary  illus- 
tration both  of  the  spirit  of  the  age  and  the 
genius  of  American  institutions.  In  another 
country,  or  at  a  previous  date,  his  history 
would  have  been    well-nigh  impossible.      He 


THE   HOUR   AND   THE    MAN.  21 

was  born,  it  would  seem,  at  the  precise  epoch 
which  demanded  such  natural  endowments  as 
his,  and  in  a  state  of  society  which  made  them 
almost  instantly  available."  The  man  was 
meant  and  fitted  for  the  hour.  He  would  be 
an  anachronism  now,  as  would  be  Daniel 
Boone  in  Kentucky,  or  George  Rogers  Clarke 
in  Illinois,  or  John  Carver  in  Massachusetts. 


CHAPTER   II. 

EARLY  DAYS. 

Horace  Greeley  came  of  a  stock  as  likely 
to  produce  a  sound  and  sturdy  growth  as  any 
in  the  world, — that  of  the  Scotch-Irish  of  Ul- 
ster, transplanted  to  the  rocky  soil  and  free  air 
of  the  Northern  New  England  hills.  He  was 
not  insensible  to  the  pride  of  ancestry,  in  the 
noblest  sense,  and  loved  to  trace  his  descent 
from  the  stanch  Protestants  of  Ulster  and 
the  heroes  of  Londonderry.  An  emigration 
from  that  city  and  its  vicinity,  embracing  a 
considerable  part  of  four  congregations,  with 
their  ministers,  impelled  by  ecclesiastical  op- 
pressions and  disabilities,  arrived  at  Boston  on 
August  4th,  1718.  After  various  explorations 
and  experiments,  they  finally  settled  upon  a 
tract  of  land  about  fifteen  miles  north  of 
Haverhill,  X.  H.,  which  they  promptly  and 
proudly  re-christened  from  Nutfield  to  Lon- 
donderry. Among  the  settlers  was  John 
Woodburn,  the  grandfather  of  Horace  Gree- 
ley's mother  ;  his  descendants  are  still,  we  be- 
lieve, occupying  the  homestead,  and  the  com- 
munity   retains    to   a  remarkable    degree    its 


EARLY   DAYS.  23 

primitive  elements  of  character,  simplicity  of 
life,  and  rural  occupation.  During  the  Revo- 
lutionary War,  this  little  town  furnished  its 
**  embattled  farmers"  to  the  number  of  three 
hundred  and  forty-seven  out  of  a  whole  adult 
male  population  of  about  five  hundred. 

On  his  father's  side,  Horace  Greeley  derived 
his  descent  from  one  of  three  brothers  of  that 
name  who  emigrated  to  America  in  1640. 
Zaccheus,  Horace's  great-grandfather,  settled 
on  the  verge  of  Londonderry,  into  the  bounds 
of  which  town  his  son  Zaccheus  removed  to 
within  a  hundred  rods  of  the  Woodburns. 
Hence  it  was  natural  that  the  third  Zaccheus 
should  marry  Mary  VVoodburn,  the  mother  of 
our  hero,  their  third  out  of  seven  children. 
He  had  the  felicity  to  escape  the  Biblical 
patronymic,  though  the  classic  name  which 
was  given  him  suggests  not  a  little  in  the  way 
of  humorous  contrast,  when  closely  examined. 
It  were  difficult  to  conceive  of  two  more  di- 
verse personalities  than  the  tuneful,  cultured, 
self-indulgent,  parasitic  Roman,  and  the  un- 
gainly, rough-spoken,  hard-worked,  indepen- 
dent New  Englander.  I  think  they  would 
have  liked  each  other  none  the  less,  however. 

It  was  not  in  Londonderry  that  our  Horace 
was  born,  on  February  3d,  181 1,  but  in  the 
neighboring  town  of  Amherst,  to  which  his 
parents  had  removed  three  years  before.     Here 


24  HORACE  GREELEY. 

Zacchcus  Greeley  had  purchased  the  "  Stewart 
farm"  of  forty  or  fifty  acres,  a  gravelly  and 
rocky  bit  of  land,  more  adapted  to  hard  work 
than  to  plentiful  or  certain^ crops.  The  house 
in  which  Horace  was  bori  was  an  unpainted 
framed  cottage  of  one  stc^%  built  in  the  box- 
like style  of  shapeless  ugliness  which  succeed- 
ed the  rather  picturesque  log-cabin  of  the 
earliest  settlers.  Its  immediate  environment 
was  a  rude  and  straggling  fence,  an  old-fash- 
ioned well,  wnth  its  mossy  bucket  swinging  high 
in  air  upon  its  long  sweep,  and  a  soil  out  of 
which  the  rocks  thrust  themselves  in  every 
direction.  There  were  "  the  orchard,  the 
meadow,  and  deep  tangled  wild  wood"  of  the 
song  ;  but  the  former,  though  of  the  same 
rocky  substratum  as  the  rest,  produced  apples 
which  made  Horace's  mouth  water  long  years 
after.  (I  suppose  we  all  think  there  never 
were  such  apples  as  the  apples  of  our  youth.) 
The  meadow  was  chiefly  a  frog-pond,  where 
the  boy  doubtless  learned  to  take  aim  at  the 
croakers  and  slippery  divers  of  the  social  and 
political  puddle  of  a  later  day.  The  house 
was  then  quite  new,  he  says  ;  "  it  was  only 
modified  in  our  time  by  filling  up  and  making 
narrower  the  old-fashioned  fireplace,  which 
havinor  devoured  all  the  wood  on  the  farm 
yawned  ravenously  for  more." 

That  voracious  fireplace  seems  to  have  been 


EARLY   DAYS.  25 

typical  of  the  general  fortunes  of  the  ances- 
tral Greeleys.  They  were  "  excellent,  though 
never  thrifty  citizens  ;  kind,  mild,  easy-going, 
honest,  and  unanrvbitious,"  marrying  young 
and  blessed  with  large  families  of  children  (the 
grandfather  having  had  thirteen,  who  all  grew  to 
be  men  and  women).  We  can  readily  trace, 
then,  the  source  of  one  side  of  their  illustrious 
descendant's  composite  and  inconsistent  na- 
ture to  the  paternal  stock — his  gentle  and 
even  childlike  qualities,  his  expansive  benevo- 
lence, his  carelessness  of  outward  appearance, 
his  unambitious  social  disposition,  his  unthrif- 
ty business  and  money  habits. 

It  was  in  spite  of  these  that  the  qualities  in- 
herited from  his  mother  led  him  on  to  success 
and  even  to  fortune,  in  the  pecuniary  sense  of 
that  word.  She  was  of  a  masculine  hardihood 
of  body,  intellect,  and  character  ;  of  cheerful 
and  untiring  industry,  working  out-doors  as 
well  as  in-doors  ;  and  a  humorist,  endowed 
with  a  constant  flow  of  animal  spirits.  It  is 
reported  of  her  that  she  "  could  out-rake  any 
man  in  the  town,  and  could  load  the  hay- 
wagon  as  fast  and  as  well  as  her  husband. 
While  doing  more  than  the  work  of  an  ordinary 
man  and  an  ordinary  woman  combined,  she 
would  laugh  and  sing  all  day  long,  and  tell 
stories  all  the  evening."  She  was  a  great  fa- 
vorite especially  with  the  children,  whom  she 


26  HORACE   GREELEY. 

delifrhted  with  an  inexhaustible  stock  of  stories 
and  songs,  and  old-country  ballads  and  tradi- 
tions, derived  from  her  immigrant  grandmoth- 
er. It  was  this  latter  source  from  which  her 
little  Horace  derived  his  first  educational  im- 
pulse, as  he  stood  beside  her  while  she  plied 
her  spinning-wheel.  She  was  also  his  first 
teacher  in  the  more  prosaic  "  rudiments." 
Horace  was  a  feeble,  sickly  child,  often  under 
medical  treatment,  and  unable  to  watch 
through  a  closed  window  the  falling  of  rain 
without  incurring  an  instant  and  violent  attack 
of  illness.  She  was  particularly  tender  of  him 
from  the  fact  of  having  lost  her  two  previous 
children  just  before  his  birth.  Hence  he  was 
kept  close  to  her  side  ;  and  from  the  spelling- 
book  on  her  knee  he  learned  to  read,  as  well  as 
to  be  entertained,  before  he  could  fairly  talk, 
and  at  an  earlier  period  than  he  could  remem- 
ber in  his  later  years.  By  a  singular  adapta- 
tion to  the  changes  of  motion  on  his  mother's 
part  while  spinning,  he  acquired  the  unwonted 
facility  of  reading  with  the  book  in  almost  any 
position,  sidewise  or  upside  down,  as  readily 
as  in  the  usual  fashion,  without  at  that  time 
thinking  it  anything  unusual.  He  read  also  in 
the  great  family  Bible,  spread  upon  the  floor 
for  his  behoof,  and  even  in  the  newspaper  with 
a  prophetic  interest.  By  the  time  he  was  three 
years  old  he  read  children's  books  with  ease, 


EARLY   DAYS.  2/ 

and  at  four  he  was  free  of  the  whole  range  of 
literature  as  far  as  it  came  under  his  eye. 

Two  months  before  he  reached  three,  he  was 
taken  home  by  his  grandfather  Woodburn  and 
sent  to  school  from  there — the  school-house  at 
home  being  two  miles  away,  while  that  of  his 
grandfather's  district  was  a  few  rods  from  the 
door.  Here  he  lived  for  most  of  the  time  dur- 
ing the  next  three  years,  and  probably  ab- 
sorbed still  more  of  the  stalwart  Woodburn 
characteristics.  The  school-house  was  even 
more  destitute  of  architecture  than  his  home. 
The  type  has  not  yet  disappeared,  even  in  the 
thriving  rural  districts  near  the  great  towns  in 
our  most  advanced  Eastern  States.  It  was  a 
single  enclosed  room  with  three  cuttings  for 
windows,  two  on  the  side  and  one  in  the  front 
or  gable  end,  where  was  also  the  door.  There 
were  no  trees  or  fence  about  it,  and  the  interior 
was  as  "  forlorn  and  uninviting"  as  the  ex- 
terior. Happy  the  child  who  has  not  had  to 
sit  from  nine  till  four  upon  those  hard 
benches,  without  backs,  except  so  far  as  the 
sharp  edge  of  the  desks  along  the  walls  afford- 
ed at  times  a  support  to  a  few  aching  and 
otherwise  stooping  little  spines.  The  school- 
house  was  crowded  to  suffocation,  and  was  in 
winter  either  scorching  or  freezing,  in  accord- 
ance with  the  relative  position  of  its  inmates 
to  the  fireplace.     The  curriculum  consisted  of 


28  HORACE    CREELEV. 

spelling,  reading,  writing,  grammar,  and  arith- 
metic, the  three  latter  of  a  very  elementary- 
grade.  The  teachers  were  usually  very  young, 
under  their  teens,  getting  about  the  wages  of  a 
farm-laborer.  The  discipline  was  of  the  most 
heroic  character,  administered  over  the  knuckles 
by  the  ferule,  or  over  the  hindmost  parts  by 
the  switch  or  "  gad." 

Horace  Greeley  was  from  the  beginning  the 
pet  and  pride  of  his  school.  He  was  a  tow- 
headed  little  fellow,  with  a  quaint  manner  and 
a  lisping  and  whining  voice,  always  good-hu- 
mored, and  "  enduring  all  things"  with  a  non- 
resistant  gentleness  which  was  recognized  as 
neither  cowardice  nor  lack  of  character.  He 
was  considered  a  prodigy  of  precocious  acqui- 
sition. His  especial  forte  was  spelling.  It 
seemed  to  be  a  natural  taste  and  instinct.  It 
became  in  those  days  a  passion,  betokening 
the  future  editor,  who  discovered  the  slightest 
deviation  from  his  rules  of  orthography  or 
punctuation,  and  treated  it  with  corresponding 
severity.  He  drilled  himself  continually  in 
those  primary  school-days,  and  even  spent 
much  time  in  spelling  hard  words  for  the  pleas- 
ure of  it,  or  to  meet  the  frequent  challenge  of 
his  family.  Constant  efforts  were  made  in  vain 
to  puzzle  him,  even  with  the  proper  names  of 
the  Bible.  In  the  weekly  evening  spelling- 
matches,  he  was  always  the  first  one  chosen  by 


EARLY   DAYS.  29 

the  side  which  had  the  "  toss,"  and  it  was  re- 
garded as  equivalent  to  victory  in  advance. 
He  was  then  so  young,  that  he  would  often 
have  to  be  wakened  before  it  came  to  his  turn. 

He  was  also  fond  of  speaking  pieces  out  of 
the  "  Columbian  Orator,"  even  before  he  could 
utter  the  words  distinctly,  and  his  frequent  and 
favorite  speech,  "  You'd  scarce  expect  one  of 
my  age,"  etc.,  in  his  self-possessed  and  confi- 
dent manner,  was  a  source  of  much  amusement. 
He  knew  the  whole  volume  by  heart,  and  it 
was  to  his  great  disgust  that  he  was  dragged 
forward  incessantly  to  recite  those  baby  lines. 
Besides  the  "  Columbian  Orator,"  the  school- 
books  of  that  day  consisted  of  Webster's 
spelling-book,  which  was  just  supplanting  Dil- 
worth's;  "  The  American  Preceptor  ;"  and  Caleb 
Bingham's  "  The  Ladies'  Accidence,"  the  only 
grammar  then  in  use,  "  as  poor  an  affair  as  its 
name  would  indicate."  Morse's  "  Geography" 
had  not  yet  come  into  vogue,  and  had  barely  one 
map.  Lindley  Murray's  "  Grammar  and  Eng- 
lish Reader"  had  not  yet  come  into  fashion,  nor 
had  Adams's  "  Arithmetic  ;"  the  former,  at  any 
rate,  was  not  well  adapted  to  beginners,  and  Mr. 
Greeley  thinks  that  Greenleaf,  a  few  years 
later,  "  shortened  the  time  and  effort  required 
to  gain  a  decent  knowledge  of  English  gram- 
mar by  at  least  one  half." 

Horace  was  an  omnivorous  reader  from  his 


30  '  HORACE   GREELEY. 

fourth  year,  devouring,  like  the  locust,  every 
dry  twig  as  well  as  green  blade  of  print  to  which 
he  could  get  access.  It  mattered  little  whether 
it  was  the  "  Confession  of  Faith,"  a  stray  alma- 
nac, the  ''  Pilgrim's  Progress,"  the  "  Arabian 
Nights"  or  "  Robinson  Crusoe,"  a  book  of 
history,  the  Bible,  or  the  weekly  newspaper. 
We  are  told  that  there  was  scarcely  a  book 
within  seven  miles  which  he  did  not  borrow. 
He  would  read  as  he  dressed  in  the  morning, 
in  every  spare  moment  he  could  gain  from 
other  studies  or  from  home  and  farm  work 
throughout  the  day,  and  even  as  he  went  about 
on  the  lighter  errands  of  the  latter,  clinging  to 
his  book  like  a  wasp  to  a  mellow  harvest  ap- 
ple. His  evenings  were  spent  in  a  veritable 
trance  of  reading,  lying  coiled  up  in  the  corner 
of  the  capacious  fireplace  by  the  light  of  a 
pine-knot,  paying  no  attention  to  those  who 
purposely  or  inadvertently  stumbled  over  him 
or  dragged  him  out  by  the  legs,  but  rolling 
himself  back  and  going  on  with  his  reading  as 
if  nothing  had  happened.  It  took  as  long  to 
arouse  him  and  get  him  off  to  bed  as  it  takes 
many  a  body  to  get  out  of  bed  in  the  morn- 
ing. 

The  newspaper  was  his  chief  delight — a  poor 
enough  affair  in  its  scope  of  news  or  editorial  ; 
but  its  advent  was  the  event  of  the  week,  which 
he  would  anticipate  by  walking  down  the  road 


EARLY   DAYS.  3  I 

to  meet  the  post-rider  that  he  might  have  the 
first  chance  at  it,  and  lying  on  the  ground 
would  absorb  its  contents  from  beginning  to 
end.  Meagre  as  was  its  intelligence,  those 
were  stirring  times,  as  Mr.  Parton  reminds  us. 
The  ground-swell  of  the  War  of  1812  had  not 
yet  subsided.  "  He  may  have  read  of  Deca- 
tur's gallantry  in  the  war  with  Algiers  ;  of 
Wellington's  victory  at  Waterloo  ;  of  Napo- 
leon, fretting  away  his  life  on  the  rock  of  St. 
Helena  ;  of  Monroe's  inauguration  ;  of  the  dis- 
mantling of  the  fleets  on  the  great  lakes  ;  of  the 
progress  of  the  Erie  Canal  project  ;  of  Jackson's 
inroads  into  Florida  and  the  subsequent  seces- 
sion of  that  province  to  the  United  States  ;  of 
the  first  meeting  of  Congress  in  the  Capitol  ;  of 
the  passage  of  the  Missouri  Compromise,"  to- 
gether with  the  important  and  fundamental 
discussions  of  Congress  over  the  various  com- 
mercial treaties  with  the  States  of  Europe. 
The  first  book  which  he  read  consecutively 
through  was  the  Bible,  under  the  guidance  of 
his  mother,  when  he  was  about  five  years 
old. 

Horace  never  neglected  his  regular  studies 
for  other  reading,  much  less  for  sports.  When 
neighbor  boys  called  in  the  evenings,  he  could 
neither  be  coaxed  nor  forced  into  play  till  he 
had  gotten  his  lessons.  He  was  not  averse  to 
fun,  and  was   fond  of  fishing,   though  never  a 


32  HORACE   GREELEY. 

leader  or  expert  in  boyish  games,  and  shrink- 
ing from  those  that  were  rude  and  brutal.  He 
was  a  non-combatant  from  his  childhood,  and 
while  not  devoid  of  spirit  as  well  as  spirits,  he 
was  singularly  amiable  and  gentle,  having  no 
enemies  and  being  a  universal  pet,  though  his 
old-fashioned  ways  and  remarks  were  a  con- 
stant source  of  amusement.  He  was  timid  in 
tlie  matter  of  noises  and  gunpowder  and  bel- 
ligerent demonstrations  on  the  part  of  other 
boys.  He  would  run  away  at  the  former,  but 
would  stand  his  ground  and  take  the  assaults 
of  the  latter  without  a  show  of  returning  them. 
His  moral  courage  was  undaunted  in  such 
things  as  ghosts  or  in  the  dark  ;  and  his  self- 
confidence  in  speaking,  or  reciting  his  lessons, 
or  questioning  the  dicta  of  teachers  and  older 
persons,  was  absurdly  sublime.  Very  seldom 
has  the  well-worn  saying  of  Wordsworth,  that 
"  the  child  is  father  of  the  man,"  been  more 
strikingly  illustrated. 

This  precocity  and  promise  were  not  un- 
noted nor  unappreciated.  Several  incidents 
may  be  adduced  in  proof.  He  was  allowed  to 
attend  the  Bedford  school,  though  out  of  his 
district,  by  an  express  vote  of  the  trustees  that 
"  no  pupils  should  be  received  from  any  other 
town,  except  Horace  Greeley  alone"  !  An 
offer  was  made  by  the  leading  men  of  his 
neighborhood,  during  his  last  summer  in  Am- 


EARLY   DAYS.  33 

herst,  to  defray  the  expense  of  sending  him  to 
Phillips  Academy  at  Exeter,  and  thence  to 
college.  His  parents,  after  full  deliberation, 
firmly  declined,  and,  though  not  having  any 
decided  opinion  himself  at  the  time,  Horace 
Greeley  expressed  in  later  life  his  gratitude  at 
not  having  been  indebted  for  what  imperfect 
schooling  he  had  to  any  except  those  from 
whom  he  had  a  right  to  expect  it.  It  may 
well  be  a  question  whether  this  independence 
of  spirit  was  not  carried  to  a  morbid  extreme. 
But  certain  it  is  that  we  should  have  had  a  very 
different  life  of  Horace  Greeley  to  write — 
whether  for  better  or  worse  we  care  not  to 
conjecture.  He  received  assistance,  however, 
from  a  friendly  clergyman,  who  supplemented 
his  grammatical  attainments,  and  a  retired  sea- 
captain,  who  lent  him  books  and  conducted  a 
continuous  examination  of  the  boy  in  geogra- 
phy, history,  and  spelling,  and  upon  the  con- 
tents of  the  books  which  he  had  been  read- 
ing. 

When  we  consider  the  few  incentives,  as  well 
as  helps,  in  that  secluded  and  rustic  neighbor- 
hood, it  is  certainly  very  remarkable  that  this 
one  poor  and  hard-worked  boy  should  have 
sprouted  up  in  that  sterile  and  ungenial  soil, 
like  the  edelweiss  among  the  icy  rocks  of  the 
Alps.  No  wonder  that  the  Londonderry  min- 
ister, having  heard  of  the  little  fellow's  school 


34  HORACE   GREELEY. 

achievements,  after  taking  an  occasion  to 
examine  him  when  they  met  out  in  the  fields, 
and  vainly  trying  to  puzzle  him,  should  have 
given  the  emphatic  testimony  :  "  Mark  my 
words,  Mr.  Woodburn,  that  boy  was  not  made 
for  nothing." 


CHAPTER    III. 

TRAINING    AND    TRAMPING. 

In  his  son's  tenth  year,  Zaccheus  Greeley's 
financial  affairs  reached  a  crisis.  The  times 
were  hard  (Horace  ascribed  them  in  later  life 
to  a  lack  of  protection  to  home  industry,  and 
says,  "  I  have  never  been  much  of  a  free- 
trader since").  When  "  almost  every  one  was 
hopelessly  involved,  and  every  third  farm  was 
in  the  sheriff's  hand,"  it  is  not  surprising  that 
the  never  fore-handed  man  had  to  be  sold  out, 
and  passed  from  a  landed  proprietor  to  the  po- 
sition of  a  hired  farm  laborer  at  fifty  cents  a 
day,  and  a  small  house  in  the  township  of 
Westhaven,  Vt.,  about  a  hundred  miles  distant 
from  Amherst,  and  six  miles  from  Lake  Cham- 
plain.  They  were  beginning  the  world  anew 
so  thoroughly  that  they  had  not  even  beds 
enough,  or  any  adequate  stock  of  the  com- 
monest utensils,  or  clothes  beyond  what  they 
wore  upon  their  backs,  and  were  in  debt  for  the 
full  amount  even  of  these.  Their  extreme 
poverty  is  illustrated  by  the  picture  of  the 
children  gathered  on  the  floor  about  their  sup- 
per of  bean-porridge,  served  in  a  milk-pan  and 


36  HORACE   GREEI.EV. 

conveyed  from  the  common  receptacle  to  each 
mouth  by  a  spoon,  the  parents  having  a  pan  to 
themselves  on  the  table  at  which  they  sat. 
Yet  they  managed  thenceforth  always  to  have 
enough  of  rye  bread,  meal  and  meat,  and  a 
little  money  to  pay  the  school  rates,  to  keep  out 
of  debt,  and,  best  of  all,  to  feel  their  need  of 
nothing.  They  were  cheerful,  contented,  and 
indifferent  to  "  looks"  or  mere  conventionali- 
ties. The  father  was  then  thirty-eight,  and 
the  mother  thirty-three  years  old  ;  and  Horace, 
the  oldest  surviving  child,  was  ten. 

He  was  now  called  to  make  study  his  second- 
ary pursuit,  and  to  aid  his  father  in  hard  out- 
door work.  This  consisted  for  two  years  in 
clearing  a  fifty-acre  wood  lot  a  mile  away.  It 
was  a  formidable  task,  especially  to  their  in- 
experience and  the  boy's  immature  physical 
development.  But  the  whole  family  went  at 
it  with  a  will,  the  father  chopping  the  larger 
logs,  and  the  two  eldest  boys  the  smaller  ones 
and  driving  the  oxen,  while  the  mother  and 
daughters  gathered  the  light  wood  into  heaps  ; 
in  the  log-rolling,  they  would  all  put  their 
shoulders  to  the  task.  "  Still,"  says  Horace 
in  after  years,  "  clearing  land  is  pleasant  work, 
especially  when  you  have  a  hundred  heaps  of 
logs  or  brush  burning  at  once  on  a  dark,  windy 
night  ;  while  ten  or  twenty  acres  of  fallen, 
leafy  timber  on   nre  at  once  affords  a  magnifi- 


TRAINING   AND   TRAMPING.  IJ 

cent  spectacle.'*  He  also  recalls  a  good  spring 
of  water  close  by,  and  plenty  of  rattlesnakes, 
who  fortunately  did  not  take  the  hint  of  med- 
dling with  the  boys'  bare  feet,  as  they  worked 
among  the  brush  and  weeds.  They  were  a 
merry  and  harmonious  company. 

The  third  year  was  spent  in  running  a  saw- 
mill on  shares,  combined  with  working  a  little 
place  bearing  the  suggestiv^e  and  unpromising 
name  of  Flea  Knoll.  The  whole  undertaking 
was  a  dead  failure,  the  chief  acquisition  being 
fever  and  ague  on  the  part  of  the  whole  fam- 
ily ;  and,  like  every  preceding  family  so  far  as 
heard  from,  they  beat  a  precipitate  retreat  from 
Flea  Knoll  the  next  spring.  Returning  to 
their  former  place,  they  spent  the  next  two 
years  in  clearing  land  and  cultivating  land  on 
shares,  with  the  usual  result  of  failure  and 
misfortune.  Nothing,  however,  could  repress 
the  Greeley  family's  capacity  of  enjoying  life, 
or  young  Horace's  faculty  for  self-improve- 
ment. If  they  could,  indeed,  "  extract  sun- 
beams from  turnips,"  he  could  cultivate  the 
turnip  on  an  iceberg.  He  had  completely  ab- 
sorbed all  that  the  Westhaven  schools  could 
furnish,  and  took  to  asking  questions  which 
were  beyond  the  capacity  of  his  instructors, 
who  gave  notice  that  he  was  **  wiser  than 
his  teachers,"  and  that  it  was  useless  for 
him  to  go  to  school  any  more.     Accordingly 


38  HORACE   GREELEY. 

he  set  up  his  pine  knots  at  home,  and  ravaged 
these  "  fresh  fields  and  pastures  new"  for  books. 
He  received  especial  assistance  from  having  the 
freedom  of  a  considerable  library  at  the  "  Man- 
sion House"  of  the  landed  proprietor  for  whom 
his  father  worked. 

By  his  eleventh  year  he  had  read  Shake- 
speare, and  by  his  fourteenth  had  read  the 
principal  histories  and  poets  accessible.  The 
last  two  departments  of  literature  were  his  fa- 
vorites, always  excepting  newspapers.  Besides 
Shakespeare,  he  was  fond  of  Byron  and  Camp- 
bell, and  would  read  them  by  the  hour.  His 
discovery  of  a  copy  of  "  Mrs.  Hemans,"  in  his 
eleventh  year,  was  an  era  in  his  mental  devel- 
opment. As  he  himself  expresses  it  :  "  I  re- 
member, as  of  yesterday,  the  gradual  unfolding 
of  the  exceeding  truthfulness  and  beauty,  the 
profound  heart-knowledge,  which  characterizes 
Mrs.  Hemans's  poems,  upon  my  own  imma- 
ture, unfolding  mind."  He  specifies  several 
(among  them  the  immorfal  "  Casabianca")  as 
"  gems  of  priceless  value,  as  spirit-wands  by 
whose  electric  touch  countless  hearts  were  first 
made  conscious  of  the  diviner  aspirations,  the 
loftier,  holier  energies  within  them. ' '  We  here 
trace  clearly  the  awakening  of  that  vein  of  sen- 
timent and  that  florid  style  which  seem  so  singu- 
lar and  even  inconsistent  in  the  usual  robust- 
ness and  plainness  of  his  opinions  and  writings. 


TRAINING   AND   TRAMPING.  39 

Horace  Greeley's  apprenticeship  to  farming 
closed  with  his  fifteenth  year.  We  have  dwelt 
thus  minutely  upon  this  phase  of  his  "  train- 
ing" because  we  find  in  it  the  sufficient  cause 
of  many  of  his  qualities  and  characteristics  as  a 
man.  It  will  account  for  his  shambling  and 
clodhopper  gait,  so  often  observed  in  boys 
brought  up  to  the  manual  drudgery  of  farm 
work  as  it  used  to  be  before  the  days  of  ma- 
chines. It  will  account,  also,  for  the  fact  that 
he  never  could  acquire  "  manners,"  and  was  a 
rustic,  and  outwardly  a  boor,  to  the  end  of  his 
life.  Above  all,  it  will  account  for  his  utter 
indifference  to,  and  incapacity  for  clothes.  In 
the  Westhaven  days,  the  family  were  all  cloth- 
ed in  home-made  garments  made  out  of  a 
coarse  homespun  linsey-woolsey  material  dyed 
with  butternut  bark.  Horace's  usual  dress  in 
summer  consisted  of  very  short  pantaloons  of 
the  above  material,  an  unbuttoned  tow  shirt 
and  a  torn  straw  hat,  supplemented  in  the  win- 
ter by  a  jacket  and  shoes.  It  is  stated  that  his 
clothing  did  not  cost  three  dollars  a  year.  Mr. 
Parton  thinks  that,  up  to  his  coming  of  age, 
"  not  fifty  dollars  in  all  were  expended  upon 
his  dress  !"  We  need  not  say  that  he  was 
training,  in  this  severe  school,  for  his  peculiar 
mission  to  clear  the  forests  of  difficulty  in  many 
directions,  to  stub  up  the  roots  of  old  traditions 
in  many  a  wider  field,  to  endure  hardship  with 


40  HORACE    G  REE  LEV. 

a  steady  perseverance  and  an  uncomplaining 
spirit,  and  to  be  unwittingly  used  as  a  drudge 
by  those  who  were  more  wily  and  selfish. 

While  only  in  his  fifth  or  sixth  year,  Horace 
was  told  by  a  blacksmith,  who  observed  the 
interest  with  which  the  child  gazed  at  his  work 
at  the  forge,  that  he  had  better  come  and  learn 
the  trade  with  him.  The  response  was  instant 
and  decided,  "  No,  I'm  going  to  be  a  printer." 
The  making  of  books  and  newspapers  seemed 
infinitely  better  work  than  the  making  of  horse- 
shoes, especially  as  his  distinction  between  the 
authorship  of  the  intellectual  and  of  the  me- 
chanical parts  of  these  was  probably  rather 
confused  at  that  time.  When  only  eleven 
years  old  he  undertook  to  realize  his  dream. 
Hearing  that  an  apprentice  was  wanted  in  the 
newspaper  office  at  Whitehall,  about  five  miles 
away,  he  applied  for  it  in  person,  accompanied 
by  his  father,  though  the  latter  went  under 
protest.  He  was  (he  says  **  properly")  reject- 
ed on  account  of  his  youth,  but  it  was  a  sore 
disappointment. 

He  did  not  attempt  it  again  till  he  was  fif- 
teen years  old,  when  he  answered  an  advertise- 
ment of  the  publishers  of  the  Northern  Spec- 
tator at  East  Poultney,  Vt.,  now  a  small  and 
decayed,  but  at  that  time  quite  enterprising, 
village  about  eleven  miles  distant.      Its  enter- 


TRAINING   AND    TRAMPING.  4[ 

prise  was  illustrated  by  the  fact  of  its  having 
a  newspaper  maintained  as  a  stock  company 
by  the  citizens.  The  manager  was  a  Mr.  Amos 
Bliss,  and  the  scene  of  Horace's  application  is 
graphically  told  by  him.  He  was  in  his  gar- 
den, when  his  attention  was  drawn  by  a  thin 
and  whining  voice  behind  him  asking  if  he  was 
"  the  man  that  carried  on  the  printing-office," 
and  whether  he  "  didn't  want  a  boy  to  learn 
the  trade."  Mr.  Bliss  then  turned  questioner, 
asking,  with  no  little  astonishment  at  the  un- 
couth, outlandishly  clad,  slim-bodied,  and 
large-headed  youth  before  him,  "  IDo  j/oic  want 
to  learn  to  print  ?"  The  "  Down-East"  reply 
was,  "  I've  had  some  notion  of  it."  He  asked 
some  further  questions  about  the  boy's  school- 
ing and  reading,  to  which  the  answer  was  that 
he  had  read  "  a  little  of  most  everything." 
Mr.  Bliss  was  a  school  inspector,  whose  special 
business  of  examining  teachers  had  made  him 
an  expert  as  well  as  given  him  a  taste  for  ask- 
ing questions,  which  art  he  now  proceeded  to 
put  in  practice.  The  result  was  that  he  soon 
discovered  "  a  mind  of  no  common  order  and 
an  acquired  intelligence  far  beyond  his  years," 
together  with  "  a  single-mindedness,  a  truth- 
fulness, and  common-sense,"  Avhich  command- 
ed both  his  respect  and  regard. 

In  the  same  manner  were  the  unfavorable 
prepossessions  of  the  foreman  in  the  printing- 


42  HORACE    GREELEY. 

office  overcome  by  a  little  conversation  ;  and 
Horace  was  made  supremely  happy  by  an  offer 
to  take  him  as  an  apprentice,  conditional  upon 
his  father's  consent.  This,  however,  was  not 
readily  obtained  in  the  subsequent  interview 
and  negotiations,  for  the  elder  Greeley  was  re- 
luctant to  have  his  son  forsake  the  immemorial 
occupation  of  his  family,  and  had  an  indepen- 
dent aversion  to  the  "  binding  out  "  of  any  of 
his  children,  as  well  as  to  the  terms, — so  that  he 
actually  declared  the  transaction  at  an  end,  and 
started  to  go  home.  But  the  boy  was  des- 
perate at  the  prospect  of  this  chance  slipping 
out  of  his  eager  grasp,  and  induced  his  father 
to  remain  and  reopen  the  business  ;  and  at 
length  a  compromise  was  effected,  whereby  he 
was  to  remain  till  twenty  years  of  age,  be  al- 
lowed .only  his  board  for  six  months,  and 
thereafter  forty  dollars  n  year  in  addition  "  for 
his  clothing."  He  seemed  to  take  to  type- 
setting by  intuition,  and  before  the  end  of  the 
first  day  could  do  better  and  quicker  work  than 
many  an  apprentice  of  several  weeks*  standing. 
This  proved  a  capital  place  for  an  apprentice 
who  had  a  will  to  work  hard,  and  a  desire  to 
learn  every  branch  of  the  printer's  business. 
The  company  was  a  financial  failure,  the  editor 
left,  the  management  was  loose,  the  force  in 
the  printing  department  was  very  small,  and 
each   one  was   at   liberty   to   do   whatever    he 


TRAINING   AND    TRAMPING.  43 

wished,  even  to  the  writing  of  original  para- 
graphs and  news  items.  He  was  kindly  treat- 
ed, and  received  increased  pay,  but  he  could 
scarcely  recall  a  day  in  which  they  were  not 
hurried  in  their  work.  He  had  no  time  for 
even  a  day's  fishing  or  hunting,  nor  for  a  game 
of  ball  ;  still  less  did  he  take  time  for  "  a  dance 
or  any  sort  of  party  or  fandango."  But  he  al- 
ways found  time  for  reading.  There  were 
plenty  of  books  at  his  disposal  in  Poultney, 
besides  a  circulating  library.  He  records  that 
he  never  afterward  found  books,  and  the  op- 
portunity to  enjoy  them,  so  ample,  and  he 
thinks  that  he  never  before  or  since  read  to  so 
much  profit.  He  occasionally  varied  his  even- 
ing reading  with  a  game  of  checkers,  of  which 
he  was  very  fond  and  proficient,  or  of  chess, 
and  even  of  cards,  though  the  latter  were  re- 
garded as  an  abomination  in  those  primitive 
communities  ;  he  never,  however,  would  gam- 
ble or  play  on  Sunday. 

He  took  a  great  interest  and  a  leading  part 
in  the  debating  society.  He  soon,  in  fact,  be- 
came the  acknowledged  leader  of  the  whole 
coterie  of  village  orators  and  statesmen  who 
composed  the  Lyceum.  Here  "  he  was  a 
real  giant,"  is  the  testimony  of  one  of  his  con- 
temporaries. He  was  always  ready  with  the 
part  assigned  him,  and  never  lost  his  self-con- 
fidence in  encountering  any  audience  or  antag- 


44  HORACE    GREELEY. 

onist.  He  took  the  debates  very  seriously, 
and  contended  as  for  cherished  and  essential 
truth.  His  prodigious  and  exact  memory 
gave  him  a  great  advantage.  He  came  to  be 
regarded  as  an  authority  on  mooted  questions, 
and,  though  a  mere  stripling,  was  always  lis- 
tened to  with  the  deference  paid  to  a  man,  and 
to  the  best  of  them.  He  never  lost  his  tem- 
per nor  got  the  ill-will  of  those  whom  he 
floored  in  debate,  or  whose  statements,  quota- 
tions, or  omissions  he  corrected.  His  manner 
was  awkward  in  the  extreme,  but  he  was  fluent 
and  interesting  always.  "  In  short,"  says  this 
authority,  "  he  spoke  in  his  sixteenth  year  just 
as  he  spoke"  in  middle  life  ;  and  when  he  came 
back  in  those  days  to  lecture,  "  I  thought  I  saw 
before  me  the  Horace  Greeley  of  the  old  Poult- 
ney  *  Forum,'  as  we  called  it."  His  outward 
appearance,  however  uncouth  still,  must  have 
changed  for  the  better,  inasmuch  as  he  never 
made  any  preparation  for  the  Lyceum,  other 
than  putting  a  jacket  over  his  open  shirt. 
Otherwise  he  wore  attire  composed  of  no  more 
pieces  and  of  very  little  better  quality  than  on 
the  Westhaven  farm. 

But  before  the  five  years  were  over,  the 
NortJiern  Spectator  had  to  stop,  the  printing- 
office  was  discontinued,  and  Horace  Greeley 
was  sent  forth  upon  the  highways  of  life  again 
to   seek  his    fortune,  and    to    find    his    niche. 


TRAINING   AND   TRAMPING.  45 

Meanwhile,  and  only  a  short  time  after  he  be- 
gan his  apprenticeship,  his  father  had  left 
Westhaven  and  settled  in  the  town  of  Wayne, 
on  the  State  line  between  Pennsylvania  and 
New  York,  but  within  the  boundaries  of  Erie 
County  in  the  former  State.  He  here  pos- 
sessed himself  of  two  or  three  hundred  acres 
of  heavily  wooded  land,  with  four  acres  of 
clearing,  and  a  log  hut.  In  paying  the  family 
at  that  time  a  farewell  visit,  Horace  was  al- 
most induced  by  his  tender-heartedness  at  part- 
ing with  them  to  reconsider  his  resolve  to  go 
on  with  his  new  vocation.  But  his  mother 
characteristically  refrained  from  adding  her 
Word  to  the  urgencies  of  the  rest  of  the  family  ; 
if  she  had,  he  says  it  might  have  overcome  his 
resolution.  Even  after  he  was  well  on  his  way, 
he  was  strongly  tempted  to  turn  back  ;  and  he 
pronounces  that  walk  to  Poultney  one  of  the 
slowest  and  saddest  of  his  life. 

His  departure  from  Poultney  was  an  event 
in  the  short  and  simple  annals  of  that  little 
hamlet.  Everybody  regretted  the  loss  of  so 
bright  an  ornament  of  their  literary  circles,  and 
of  one  whose  gentle  and  virtuous  character  had 
won  universal  respect  and  affection.  The 
kindly  Boniface  with  whom  he  had  boarded, 
and  one  of  the  other  guests,  presented  him 
with  an  overcoat — old,  but  a  very  comfortable 
thing  for  a  foot  traveller  to  have  in  the  morn- 


46  HORACE   GREELEY. 

ings  and  evenings,  even  in  summer.  A  whiie 
overcoat  does  not  seem  to  have  become  a  prime 
essential  yet.  His  landlady  gave  him  the 
wherewithal  to  warm  his  heart,  a  pocket  Bible. 
His  footsteps  were  first  directed  to  his  fa- 
ther's house,  though  not  in  anywise  as  a  prodi- 
gal returned,  notwithstanding  that  his  outward 
appearance  might  have  awakened  the  suspicions 
of  those  who  passed  him  on  the  road, — particu- 
larly his  sore  leg,  which  he  had  injured  three 
years  before  in  stepping  from  a  box,  and  which 
the  posture  of  a  type-setter  had  prevented  from 
healing.  It  swelled  "prodigiously"  at  times, 
and  of  course  affected  his  walking  ;  and  there 
fore  it  ought  to  be  taken  into  consideration 
when  we  are  inclined  to  be  critical  of  his 
shambling  and  breaking-down  gait  in  after  life. 
It  was  a  long  time  before  the  wound  was 
healed,  by  the  use  of  electricity,  leaving  a  long 
red  scar  for  life.  It  might  have  gone  hard 
with  him,  his  physician  said,  if  it  had  not  been 
for  hisstrictly  temperate  habits.  With  "  lifts" 
from  wagons  and  boats,  he  made  his  way 
along  the  Champlain  canal  and  lake  to  Troy, 
and  by  the  Erie  canal  to  Buffalo,  by  Lake 
Erie  to  Dunkirk,  and  thence  across  to  Chau- 
tauqua County  to  his  father's  place,  ^vhich  was 
just  opposite  Clymer  in  that  county.  This 
shabby  and  shambling  figure  was  the  very  re- 
verse of  a  prodigal.     His  exceeding  scantiness 


TRAINING  AND   TRAMPING,  47 

and  inexpensiveness  in  dress  were  due  not  to 
self-indulgence,  but  to  the  fact  that  now,  and 
all  through  his  apprenticeship,  and  years  after, 
his  meagre  income  was  squeezed  to  the  utmost 
that  he  might  send  every  possible  dollar  to  his 
struggling  and  debt-burdened  father.  Shab- 
biness  and  semi-nakedness  become  a  royal 
purple  under  the  light  of  such  a  fact. 

After  spending  several  weeks  at  home,  he 
sought  work  at  his  trade  in  various  directions, 
finding  a  little  at  Jamestown,  and  then  at  Lodi, 
in  Cattaraugus  County,  N.  Y.  But  the  jobs  he 
found  were  so  temporary  and  the  pay  so  small 
and  precarious,  that  he  actually  went  home, 
and  tested  once  more  his  unfitness  for  a 
pioneer  life  and  for  chopping  wood.  Resolv- 
ing to  try  the  little  village  printing-offices  no 
longer,  he  pushed  across  the  country  and 
through  the  woods  to  Erie,  Pa.,  thirty  miles 
away,  on  the  shores  of  Lake  Erie.  It  was  quite 
a  large  and  busy  town,  with  two  printing-offices, 
one  of  which  published  a  weekly  paper  called 
the  Erie  Gazette.  Here,  notwithstanding  his 
usual  disadvantage,  resulting  from  his  unpre- 
possessing appearance  (for  he  still  wore  the 
Westhaven  costume  already  described,  and  had 
not  at  all  improved  his  grace  of  gait  and  man- 
ner), he  obtained  employment  at  fifteen  dollars 
a  month.  Mr.  Sterrett,  the  proprietor,  at  first 
rejected  him  as  too  obviously  "  green"  a  hand, 


48  HORACE   GREELEY. 

misled  also  by  his  modest  replies  as  to  his 
qualifications,  and  suspecting  him  to  be  a  run- 
away apprentice  ;  so  poor  Horace  walked  dis- 
consolately and  almost  despairingly  home, 
having  been  refused  also  at  the  other  office  of 
the  town.  But  by  one  of  the  acts  of  a  singu- 
lar and  kind  providence,  a  neighbor  of  his 
father's  happened  to  see  Mr.  Sterrett,  and  in- 
quired casually  whether  he  wanted  an  appren- 
tice. On  receiving  an  affirmative  answer  he 
mentioned  Horace  Greeley,  and  was  so  suc- 
cessful in  combating  the  objections  that  the  boy 
was  given  a  fair  trial,  and  was  taken  into  the 
office  and  as  a  boarder  at  his  employer's  house. 
It  is  one  of  the  saddest  and  most  unfortu- 
nate things  in  life  that  so  many  people  are 
controlled  by  their  **  first  impressions,"  and 
usually  in  proportion  to  the  superficiality  of 
those  impressions.  This  "  prodigal  "  and 
tramp  needed  only  a  closer  look  under  the 
homespun,  bare-legged,  scanty,  and  unfitting 
wardrobe,  and  the  old  slouchy  hat  on  the  ex- 
treme back  of  his  head,  to  discover  a  face  of 
singular  beauty  and  purity  of  expression,  and 
a  finely  developed  head  ;  and  closer  question- 
ing would  as  speedily  show  that  he  carried 
more  on  his  shoulders  than  the  red  handker- 
chief tied  to  a  stick.  That  large  brain-case, 
too  large  then  for  his  tall  and  slender  body, 
carried    a    library    of    knowledge  minutely  re- 


TRAINING  AND    TRAMPING.  49 

tained  by  his  tenacious  memory,  a  thorough 
acquaintance  with  his  craft,  and  a  mature  and 
teeming  thought.  Horace  Greeley's  experi- 
ence should  stand  as  a  pathetic  appeal  to  us  to 
be  more  like  God,  who  "judgeth  not  by  the 
outward  appearance,"  especially  when  there  is 
no  "  judgment"  exercised  at  all.  The  very 
simplicity  of  his  guileless  countenance  was 
turned  against  him  by  persons  who  pro- 
nounced him  "  an  idiot  "  on  the  spot.  There 
was  no  deformity  for  their  excuse,  as  in  the 
case  of  the  late  Dr.  Wisner,  of  Lockport,  who 
became  so  used  to  be  so  judged  that  he  rather 
enjoyed  it.  as  that  very  able  and  eloquent  di- 
vine could  well  afford  to  do.  He  one  day 
overheard  some  persons,  whom  he  passed  in 
the  street,  say  to  each  other,  *'  Did  you  see 
that  idiot?"  He  immediately  turned,  and 
said  in  his  drawling  and  inimitable  way.  "  Ain't 
you  sorry  for  me  ?" 


CHAPTER     IV. 

ATTEMPTS  AT  LIFE. 

Horace  Greeley's  stay  at  Erie  was  a  rep- 
etition of  his  life  at  former  places  in  all  essen- 
tial points.  There  was  the  same  diligence  and 
industry  in  his  work,  never  losing  a  day  ;  the 
same  devotion  of  every  spare  hour  to  reading  ; 
the  same  seeming  parsimony  ;  and  the  same 
scanty  and  anomalous  dress,  and  the  same  self- 
sacrificing  devotion  of  his  earnings  to  his  par- 
ents. "  You  see,  Mr.  Sterrett,"  he  said, 
'*  my  father  is  on  a  new  place,  and  I  want  to 
help  him  all  I  can."  He  reserved  twenty-five 
dollars  for  himself  for  future  exigencies  out  of 
his  seven  months*  earnings  at  Erie,  having  spent 
only  six  ;  and  the  whole  of  the  balance  went  to 
his  father. 

A  short  trial  in  vain  to  obtain  work  on  the 
lowest  terms  (fifteen  dollars  a  month  with 
board,  and  even  less)  convinced  him  that  the 
West  furnished  a  supply  in  excess  of  the  de- 
mand, for  even  where  there  was  a  vacancy, 
and  he  answered  an  advertisement,  he  met 
with  the  usual  rejection.  Therefore,  upon  full 
consideration,  and  though  he  felt  himself  too 


ATTEMPTS   AT    LIFE.  5  I 

young  for  such  a  venture,  he  decided  to  turn 
his  steps  to  what  he  calls  the  *'  Commercial 
Emporium."  So  with  very  "little  extra 
clothing"  in  his  bundle  (and,  for  that  matter, 
very  little  on  his  person),  or  money  in  his  purse, 
he  started  out  from  his  father's  cabin  after  a 
visit  which  he  felt  might  be  the  last  for  a  long 
time. 

Was  there  ever  such  a  pathetic  and  yet  in- 
spiring spectacle,  or  such  a  seemingly  forlorn 
hope  as  that  of  this  simple-hearted,  unworld- 
lywise  stripling  in  his  strange  attire  and  un- 
gainly movement,  tramping  toward  he  knew 
not  what  or  to  what  fate,— his  sole  fortune  in 
his  active  brain  and  nimble  fingers,  and  his 
sole  hope  in  the  consciousness  of  a  pure  heart 
and  honest  aims  and  the  deep-seated  belief  in 
a  Heavenly  Father's  love  ?  There  is  nothing 
to  equal  it  in  the  legend  of  Richard  Whitting- 
ton,  for  he  had  no  illusion  that  the  streets  were 
paved  with  gold,  and  there  were  no  Bow-bells 
to  ring  in  his  discouraged  ears,  "  Turn  again, 
Whittington,  Lord  Mayor  of  London  !"  For- 
tunately, however,  he  had  something  better 
than  a  cat  to  found  his  fortunes  on.  And  Ben- 
jamin Franklin,  the  smug  and  facile,  already 
old  in  a  varied  experience  of  the  world's  good 
and  evil,  seems  vulgar  and  commonplace  be- 
side him,  notwithstanding  the  striking  anal- 
ogies in  the  careers  of  the  two  great  represent- 


U8RARY 

UNivERsnYoriummi 


52  HORACE   GREELEY. 

ative    printers,   journalists,    philosophers,    and 
philanthropists  of  our  country. 

It  was  midsummer  when  he  started,  and  he 
walked  to  Buffalo  through  the  woods  till  he 
could  take  the  canal-boat  thence  to  Lockport. 
Thence  he  walked  out  to  Gaines,  along  a  hot 
and  dusty  "  ridge  road,"  to  visit  a  friend, 
drinking  water  till  his  mouth  and  throat 
seemed  "  coated  with  a  scale  like  that  often 
found  incrusting  a  long-used  tea-kettle."  The 
next  day  his  friend  accompanied  him  to  the 
canal,  where  he  waited  for  a  boat  long  after 
his  friend  was  obliged  to  leave  him.  He 
waited  alone  in  the  pitchy  darkness  till  after 
midnight,  and  then  started  down  the  tow-path 
to  Brockport,  some  fifteen  miles  away.  Plenty 
of  boats  were  going  the  opposite  way,  and  as 
their  head-lights  hove  in  sight  he  was  obliged 
to  "  plunge  down  the  often  rugged  and  briery 
off-bank  of  the  tow-path,  to  avoid  being  caught 
by  the  tow-line  and  hauled  into  the  not  quite 
transparent  and  nowise  inviting  '  drink.' 
"  Though  the  almanac  made  that  night  short," 
he  adds,  "  it  seemed  to  me  quite  long  ;  and  I 
gladly  hailed  and  boarded  at  Brockport  a  line- 
boat  heading  eastward  ;"  and  turning  in,  he 
slept  the  sleep  of  the  just  and  the  worn-out, 
attracting  the  special  attention  of  the  passen- 
gers— probably  in  part  by  his  audible  enjoy- 
ment of  repose,  for  Horace  Greeley  was  always 


ATTEMPTS   AT   LIFE.  53 

a  prodigious  snorer.  He  reached  Schenectady 
about  6  P.M.,  and  took  the  turnpike  to  Albany, 
the  railroad  between  the  two  cities  not  yet  be- 
ing built  (there  was,  in  fact,  no  railroad  in  the 
State  or  in  the  United  States),  unless  we  ex- 
cept the  little  horse-track  laid  from  the  Quincy 
quarries  to  convey  stones  for  the  Bunker  Hill 
monument,  and  two  or  three  other  tramways 
of  the  same  kind.  It  took  him  twenty-four 
hours  from  Albany  to  reach  New  York,  having 
missed  the  day-boat  and  been  obliged  to  take 
a  tow-boat  at  a  later  hour. 

It  was  six  o'clock  on  the  morning  of  August 
1 8th,  1 83 1,  that  Horace  Greeley  entered  New 
York  at  Whitehall,  near  the  Battery.  He  is 
graphically  described  by  a  writer  in  Putnani  s 
MontJily  as  "an  overgrown,  awkward,  white- 
headed,  forlorn-looking  boy  ;  a  pack  suspended 
on  a  staff  over  his  right  shoulder  ;  his  dress 
unrivalled  in  sylvan  simplicity  since  the  prim- 
itive fig-leaves  of  Eden  ;  the  expression  of  his 
face  presenting  a  strange  union  of  wonder  and 
apathy  ;  and  his  whole  appearance  giving  you 
the  impression  of  a  runaway  apprentice  in  des- 
perate search  of  employment.  Ignorant  alike 
of  the  world  and  its  ways,  he  seemed  to  the 
denizen  of  the  city  almost  like  a  wanderer  from 
some  other  planet.  His  ungainly  motions  had 
something  so  grotesque  in  their  gracelessness, 


54  HORACE   GREELEY. 

that  people  stopped  in  the  streets  to  gaze  at 
him."  Yet  "  the  face  of  this  uncouth  lad  " 
was  "  lighted  up  with  a  peculiar  beauty,"  lines 
of  rare  intelligence  beneath  the  listless  expres- 
sion ;  a  high,  smooth  forehead,  rounded  with 
artistic  symmetry  ;  firm,  well-cut  lips,  combin- 
ing sweetness  and  force  in  harmonious  propor- 
tions, and  revealing  the  workings  of  an  active 
and  vigorous  mind. 

His  outfit  consisted  of  ten  dollars  in  cash, 
the  clothes  in  his  bundle  hardly  appraisable  in 
money  value,  and  **  a  decent  knowledge  (as  he 
modestly  expresses  it)  of  the  art  of  printing,  so 
far  as  a  boy  will  usually  learn  it  in  the  office  of 
a  country  newspaper."  He  knew  no  human 
being  within  two  hundred  miles,  had  no  letters 
of  recommendation,  and  was  timid  in  approach- 
ing strangers,  as  well  as  without  tact  or  "  ad- 
dress "  in  pushing  himself  into  notice.  He  was 
one  of  those  persons  who  have  to  be  "  found 
out,"  for  he  had  none  of  the  arts  of  discover- 
ing what  was  in  himself,  and  was  sadly  incapa- 
ble of  putting  his  "  best  foot  foremost." 

New  York  was  then  a  small  city,  numbering 
about  two  hundred  and  twenty  thousand  in- 
habitants, with  no  railroad  connections,  no 
ocean  steamships,  and  with  a  trade  hardly  to 
be  called  such  beside  her  imperial  commerce  of 
to-day.  And  yet  her  masses  of  buildings  and 
furlongs  of   masts  and  yards  struck  his  inex- 


ATTEMPTS   AT   LIFE.  55 

perienced  eyes  with  a  wonder  and  admiration 
akin  to  awe. 

The  young  and  unsophisticated  adventurer, 
on  landing,  walked  into  and  up  Broad  Street  in 
search  of  a  boarding-house,  but  was  dismayed 
to  find  the  one  at  which  he  first  inquired,  on 
the  corner  of  that  street  and  Wall,  accessible 
only  at  six  dollars  a  week.  He  did  not  need, 
he  quaintly  says,  the  landlord's  kind  sugges- 
tion that  he  would  probably  prefer  one  where 
the  charge  was  more  moderate.  His  next  es- 
say was  over  on  the  other  side  of  the  city,  at 
168  West  Street,  where  he  obtained  board  at 
two  dollars  and  a  half.  The  establishment  was 
as  much  a  grog-shop  as  a  boarding-house,  kept 
by  a  man  named  McGolrick,  who  fell  a  victim 
to  his  own  bar  not  long  afterward.  It  was, 
however,  decently  and  quietly  kept,  and  *'  mine 
host"  and  his  family  were  kind  and  friendly. 
He  was  not  yet  prepared  for  the  strictly  vege- 
tarian quality  of  his  diet  on  Fridays,  nor  for 
the  unlimited  card-playing  of  Sunday  evenings. 

His  next  step  was  to  start  forth,  after  break- 
fast the  following  morning,  in  quest  of  employ- 
ment, having  expended  half  his  ten  dollars  in 
some  new  clothes  of  doubtful  improvement. 
Being  totally  ignorant  of  the  city,  and  not  real- 
izing that  the  printing-offices  were  confined  to 
a  limited  district,  he  took  many  needless  steps, 
traversing  entire  streets  which  had  not  a  single 


56  HORACE   GREELEY. 

one.  His  old  ill-success  had  followed  him.  It 
seemed  almost  as  if  this  modern  world-mover 
would  never  find  a  fulcrum  for  his  lever,  or 
the  tiniest  crevice  wherein  to  insert  his  pick 
for  the  making  of  a  niche  for  himself.  He  es- 
timates that  he  must  have  visited  at  least  two 
thirds  of  the  printing-offices  in  New  York 
during  that  day  and  the  next.  The  wide  dif- 
ference between  perseverance  and  push  was 
illustrated  by  the  fact  that  he  would  simply 
ask,  "  Do  you  want  a  hand?"  and  on  receiv- 
ing the  uniform  answer,  "  No,"  would  turn 
silently  and  go  out.  At  one  place  he  ventured 
a  self-vindication.  David  Hale,  of  the  Journal 
of  Commerce  J  not  only  refused  him,  but  charged 
him  rudely  with  being  a  runaway  apprentice, 
and  told  him  he  had  better  go  home  to  his 
master  ;  and  cut  short  his  attempt  at  explana- 
tion with  the  words,  "  Be  off  about  your  busi- 
ness and  don't  bother  us  !" 

It  was  another  critical  moment  in  his  life 
when,  weary  and  disheartened,  and  disgusted 
with  New  York,  he  came  home  to  his  lodgings 
on  Saturday  evening  resolved  to  shake  the 
city's  dust  from  his  feet  on  Monday  morning, 
before  his  last  penny  should  be  gone,  and  try 
again  the  inland  towns.  But  the  good  hand 
of  Providence  was  about  the  lad  even  in  that 
groggy  and  un-Sabbath-like  habitat,  from 
which    he   escaped   twice   that   day   to   attend 


ATTEMPTS   AT   LIFE.  57 

church.  It  so  happened  that  among  the  young 
Irishmen  who  resorted  to  McGolrick's,  and 
who  all  took  a  characteristic  interest  in  the 
friendless  youth,  was  one  who  gave  him  the 
address  of  a  place  where  he  knew  that  printers 
were  wanted.  This  was  at  John  T.  West's, 
over  McElrath  &  Bangs's  publishing  house,  85 
Chatham  Street,  West  being  printer  for  the 
house.  Horace  was  on  the  ground  as  early 
as  half-past  five  on  Monday  morning,  and  sat 
waiting  on  the  stoop  for  nearly  an  hour  and 
a  half  before  the  doors  were  opened.  One  of 
the  journeyman  printers,  a  Vermonter,  arrived 
a  few  minutes  before  the  opening,  and  sitting 
down  beside  the  rustic  youth,  entered  into  con- 
versation with  him.  He  became  greatly  inter- 
ested in  his  fellow-Yankee,  and  accompanied 
him  to  the  office,  and  succeeded  in  persuading 
the  foreman  to  give  him  a  trial. 

Even  then  he  would  not  have  succeeded 
if  there  had  not  been  a  job  on  hand  which 
no  other  printer  in  the  city  would  accept. 
This  was  to  set  up  what  he  describes  as  "  a 
very  small  (32mo)  New  Testament  in  double 
columns  of  agate  type,  each  column  barely 
twelve  ems  wide,  with  a  centre  column  of 
notes  in  pearl  only  four  ems  wide  ;  the  text 
thickly  studded  with  references,  by  Greek  and 
superior  letters,  to  the  notes,  which  of  course 
were    preceded    and    discriminated    by    corre- 


58  HORACE    GREELEY. 

sponding  indices,  with  prefatory  and  supple- 
mentary remarks  on  each  Book,  set  in  pearl 
and  only  paid  for  as  agate."  The  mere  de- 
scription, in  these  days  of  weak  eyes,  makes  us 
fairly  shudder  at  the  thought  of  reading  such 
an  ophthalmic  book, — how  much  more  to  set 
it  in  type.  Mr.  Greeley  pronounced  this  the 
slowest,  and  by  far  the  most  difficult  work  he 
had  ever  undertaken.  With  his  utmost  care 
his  proofs  at  first  "  looked  as  though  they  had 
caught  the  chicken-pox,"  and  required  three 
correctings  before  stereotyping,  so  that  the 
whole  work  required  nearly  double  the  time 
for  ordinary  composition.  He  was  also  some- 
times kept  waiting  for  letter.  So  that  "  by 
diligent  type-sticking  for  twelve  or  fourteen 
hours  per  day,"  he  was  able  for  two  or  three 
weeks  scarcely  to  make  his  board,  and  at  his 
best  to  earn  only  five  to  six  dollars  a  week. 
He  had,  however,  the  advantage  of  retaining 
the  job  to  the  end. 

Then  again  he  was  out  of  work  ;  and  after 
a  short  and  unpaid  job  on  a  short-lived  month- 
ly he  got  back  to  West's,  where  he  was  set  at 
Dr.  George  Bush's  "  Notes  on  Genesis,"  which 
had  just  come  in,  and  which  he  worked  on  to  the 
end.  This  was  not  quite  so  bad  as  the  poly- 
glot Testament,  but  the  copy  was  wretchedly 
illegible,  the  page  small,  and  the  type  close, 
and   the   author   indulged   himself  with   many 


ATTEMPTS   AT   LIFE.  59 

vexatious  alterations  in  the  proof.  Still  he  re- 
gretted to  reach  the  end  of  it,  as  it  put  him  again 
out  of  work,  and  he  was  so  discouraged  that 
he  seriously  meditated  trying  some  other  busi- 
ness. Fortunately  for  him  the  extremely  hard 
times  prevented  his  carrying  out  such  a  design, 
and  on  January  ist  he  got  another  job. 
This  was  on  the  Spirit  of  the  Times,  destined 
to  be  a  famous  sporting  paper,  started  and 
conducted  for  years  by  the  noted  Colonel 
William  T.  Porter,  who  had  been  his  foreman 
at  West's.  Notwithstanding  his  precarious 
pay  and  the  devastating  cholera  season  of  1832, 
Horace  clung  to  this  work  through  the  spring 
and  summer.  In  the  autumn  he  found  work 
for  the  rest  of  the  year  at  the  stereotyping 
establishment  of  J.  S.  Redfield,  afterward  a 
prominent  publisher. 

He  had  long  since  changed  his  boarding- 
house  to  a  more  reputable  and  convenient  one, 
at  the  corner  of  Chatham  and  Duane  streets, 
nearly  opposite  the  place  where  he  worked  at 
West's.  His  spare  time,  when  he  could  take 
any,  except  for  meals  and  sleep,  was  spent 
largely  in  studying  the  city,  its  life,  its  varied 
occupations,  and  its  people,  especially  the  in- 
dustrial classes.  Once  during  an  unemployed 
fortnight  he  attended  the  sittings  of  a  Tariff 
Convention  at  the  American  Institute  in  the 
City  Hall   Park,   where   the   delegates  and  de- 


6o  HORACE   GREELEV. 

baters  would  have  been  strangely  exercised  to 
be  foretold  that  the  odd  and  simple-looking 
stripling,  who  drank  in  their  wisdom  with  open 
mouth,  would  one  day  be  their  great  leader, 
champion,  and  sage.  Thirty-four  years  after- 
ward, on  taking  the  chair  as  President  of  the 
American  Institute,  he  spoke  of  this  conven- 
tion as  one  of  the  influences  that  had  deepened 
and  strengthened  the  principles  of  Protection 
which  from  early  boyhood  he  had  imbibed 
while  sitting  at  the  feet  of  Henry  Clay  and 
other  champions  of  the  doctrine. 

Among  the  other  disheartening  experiences 
of  poor  Horace  during  those  dark  hours  which 
were  just  before  the  dawn  were  his  dimissal 
from  the  Evening  Post  on  account  of  its  alleged 
prejudice  for  having  "decent-looking  men  in 
the  office,"  and  his  failure  to  obtain  employ- 
ment for  more  than  a  few  days  on  the  Commcr- 
cial  Advertiser. 


CHAPTER   V. 

INCIPIENT    JOURNALISM. 

Horace  Greeley's  'prentice  and  journey- 
man days  were  now  to  end.  Notwithstanding 
the  hardship  and  struggle  of  those  years,  he 
was  able  to  say  long  after:  **  They  say  that 
apprenticeship  is  distasteful  to  and  out  of 
fashion  with  the  boys  of  our  day  ;  if  so,  I  re- 
gret it  for  their  sakes.  To  the  youth  who 
asks,  '  How  shall  I  obtain  an  education  ?  '  I 
would  answer,  *  Learn  a  trade  of  a  good  mas- 
ter.* I  hold  firmly  that  most  boys  may  thus 
better  acquire  the  knowledge  they  need  than 
by  spending  four  years  in  college." 

While  working  on  the  Spirit  of  the  Times 
Horace  tried  his  hand  quite  frequently  on 
short  articles  and  paragraphs,  as  he  had  done 
before  on  the  Northern  Spectator.  The  fore- 
man of  that  establishment  was  Francis  V. 
Story,  very  nearly  his  own  age,  who  became  a 
devoted  friend.  Clubbing  their  small  means 
(about  two  hundred  dollars),  these  two  young 
men  entered  into  partnership  as  printers,  get- 
ting a  job  on  a  Bank-Note  Reporter.,  devoted 
largely  to  the  lottery  business.     Soon  Dr.  H.  D. 


62  HuKACt:    GREELEY. 

Shepard,  through  a  mutual  acquaintance,  found 
them  out  and  proposed  to  them  to  become  the 
publishers  of  the  Morning  Post,  his  projected 
cheap  paper,  of  which  we  have  spoken  in  Chap- 
ter I.  He  was  almost  a  monomaniac  on  news- 
papers and  periodicals,  having  already  an  inter- 
est in  a  medical  magazine  and  a  weekly  paper. 
His  original  capital  was  fifteen  hundred  dollars, 
already  nearly  exhausted,  but  he  must  needs 
try  his  new  journalistic  kite. 

It  required  vigorous  scratching  for  the  print- 
er boys  to  scrape  together  the  funds  for  the 
"  plant  "  needed  to  undertake  this  job.  Fi- 
nally, George  Bruce,  who  for  a  generation  or 
more  had  ]\Ir.  Greeley  for  a  profitable  customer 
to  the  amount  of  tens  of  thousands  of  dollars, 
was  induced  to  furnish  the  necessary  type  on 
credit  ;  and  the  first  number  of  the  Morning 
Post  was  issued  on  January  1st,  1833,— though 
not  at  one  cent,  as  Dr.  Shepard  designed,  but 
at  two  cents,  as  Greeley  insisted.  The  ofifice 
of  publication  was  at  the  southwest  corner  of 
Nassau  and  Liberty  streets,  diagonally  across 
from  the  old  South  Dutch  Church,  afterward 
the  Post  Office.  New  Year's  Day,  and  that  a 
stormy  one,  with  a  heavy  fall  of  snow  upon  the 
ground,  was  a  poor  day  for  bringing  out  a  new 
paper,  especially  one  which  had  not  been  long 
and  loudly  heralded.  It  fell  upon  the  town  a 
dead  failure.     There  was  no  capital  to  employ 


INCIPIENT   JOURNALISM.  63 

editors,  reporters,  and  correspondents,  or  even 
to  pay  the  printers  after  the  first  week.  The 
desperate  expedient  of  reducing  the  price  to 
one  cent  did  not  better  matters,  and  in  a  little 
over  three  weeks  the  infant  pioneer  of  the  cheap 
daily  press  died  for  want  of  pecuniary  breath. 

Our  young  firm  of  Greeley  &  Story,  however, 
continued  to  do  a  fair  and  increasing  business 
as  printers,  "  particularly  at  lottery  printing,'* 
as  their  advertisement  expressed  it.  They  had 
Sylvester's  Bank- Note  Reporter^  and  a  tri- week- 
ly sheet  called  the  Constitutionalist y  the  special 
organ  of  that  business,  which  was  then  under 
State  auspices.  Horace,  though  he  lived  to 
advocate  with  zeal  the  suppression  of  lotteries, 
had  then  no  scruples  on  the  subject,  and  even 
published  an  article  defending  the  business 
from  the  odium  excited  by  the  suicide  of  a 
young  man  who  had  lost  all  his  property  in 
this  form  of  gambling.  He  was,  moreover,  an 
expert  in  arranging  the  tables  and  schemes  in 
the  most  attractive  forms.  Those  were  the 
days  when  churches  and  benevolent  institutions 
were  built  by  means  of  lotteries,  and  men  high 
in  the  church,  like  Dudley  S.  Gregory,  of  Jer- 
sey City,  found  "millions  in.it."  Mr.  Greg- 
ory was  attracted  by  these  marks  of  ability  and 
serviceableness  on  Greeley's  part,  and  threw 
much  business  in  his  way,  and  he  was  always 
afterward  a  warm  and  munificent  friend. 


64  HORACE   GREELEY. 

On  July  9th,  1833,  ^^^-  Story  was  drowned 
while  bathing  in  the  East  River,  and  his  place 
in  the  partnership  was  filled  by  Jonas  Win- 
chester. It  was  a  bitter  sorrow  to  Horace 
Greeley  to  lose  the  man  whom  he  called  his 
nearest  and  dearest  friend,  and  over  his  coffin 
he  uttered  the  pathetic  words,  "  Shall  I  ever 
meet  with  any  one  who  will  bear  with  me  as 
you  did  ?'*  It  was  not  long  before  the  increas- 
ing prosperity  and  accumulating  profits  of 
Greeley  &  Company's  business  encouraged 
them  in  what  inaugurated  a  new  step  in  Ameri- 
can journalism, — the  publication  of  a  literary 
weekly,  which  combined  also  the  quality  of  a 
newspaper  and  a  political  journal.  Winches- 
ter was  to  take  charge  of  the  printing  and 
the  busine  s  management,  and  Greeley,  who 
had  already  shed  much  subordinate  and 
surreptitious  ink  in  editorial  paragraphs,  was 
to  be  at  last  a  real  editor.  The  lYezv  Yorker 
was  issued,  **  with  no  premonitory  sound  of 
trumpet,"  on  March  22d,  1834.  Itwasalarge, 
good-looking,  well-printed  folio  sheet  (after- 
ward enlarged  to  a  double  quarto),  at  two  dol- 
lars a  year  for  the  former  size  and  three  dollars 
for  the  latter,  increased  in  the  hard  times  to  an 
additional  dollar  each.  No  one  can  glance 
over  its  files  even  to-day  without  being  struck 
by  its  readableness,  its  life  and  point  and  taste, 
shown  alike  in  editorials,  literary  criticisms  and 


INCIPIENT  JOURNALISM.  6$ 

selections,  its  fulness  and  accuracy  of  news, 
and  its  miscellaneous  paragraphs.  As  respects 
the  selections,  Mr.  Greeley,  as  President  of  the 
Press  Club  which  gave  the  great  banquet  to 
Mr.  Dickens  thirty  years  after,  related  the  in- 
teresting fact  that  he  had  published  in  the  first 
number  of  the  NeziJ  Yorker  a  story — "  Mr. 
Watkins  Tottle** — by  a  then  unknown  writer 
who  signed  himself  "  Boz."  It  was  far  in  ad- 
vance of  all  preceding  periodicals  in  this  coun- 
try ;  and,  considering  the  limited  facilities  of 
those  days,  we  venture  to  claim  for  it  a  supe- 
riority as  an  "  all-round  "  paper  to  anything 
since.  Its  political  department  was  conducted 
in  a  non-partisan  spirit,  and  became  the  author- 
ity of  the  country  on  political  statistics,  as  was 
the  Tribune  afterward. 

Of  the  first  number  only  one  hundred  were 
sold,  the  subscription  list  including  scarcely  a 
dozen.  The  second  number  doubled  the  sale, 
and  the  increase  was  kept  up  from  week  to 
week  till  the  circulation  was  forty-five  hundred 
at  the  beginning  of  volume  two,  rising  steadily 
to  over  nine  thousand.  It  was  universally  well 
received  and  noticed  by  the  press  of  the  land, 
and  became  exceedingly  popular  and  prized  by 
the  people.  No  one,  however,  enjoyed  it  as 
much  as  the  editor,  who  revelled  in  this  first 
experience  of  untrammelled  expression  and 
journalistic    creativeness,   till    the    deepening 


(^  HORACE   GREELEY. 

shadows  of  financial  failure  made  those  years  a 
sustained  misery.  There  never  was  good  busi- 
ness management,  nor  any  continuous  and 
competent  publisher  for  any  length  of  time. 
It  was  just  in  season  to  be  struck  by  the  com- 
mercial cyclone  of  1837,  and  as  it  was  sold  to 
subscribers  on  credit,  it  became  impossible  to 
collect  its  bills,  even  in  the  depreciated  curren- 
cy of  the  time.  There  was  a  weekly  loss 
thenceforward  of  one  hundred  to  two  hun- 
dred dollars,  not  from  a  lack  of  subscribers, 
but  of  subscription  money.  It  was  in  vain  to 
appeal,  in  the  most  pathetic  or  imperative 
terms.  Twenty-five  hundred  names  were 
stricken  off  the  list  at  a  stroke,  and  every  pos- 
sible retrenchment  of  expenses  made.  Every 
financial  expedient  consistent  with  honor  was 
also  tried.  In  fact,  it  was  upon  a  point  of 
honor  that  Mr.  Greeley  felt  obliged  to  keep 
the  paper  a-going  in  that  dreadful  year,  since 
to  stop  would  have  left  him  in  debt  to  his  sub- 
scribers, and  without  the  means  to  pay  them, 
together  with  his  other  obligations.  "  If  any 
one,"  he  says,  "  would  have  taken  the  busi- 
ness and  debts  off  my  hands  upon  my  giving 
my  note  for  two  thousand  dollars,  I  would 
have  jumped  at  the  chance,  and  tried  to  work 
out  the  debt  by  setting  type,  if  nothing  better 
offered." 

No  man  ever    had   such  a  horror  of  debt. 


INCIPIENT  JOURNALISM.  6/ 

"  To  be  hungry,  ragged,  and  penniless  is  not 
pleasant,"  he  said,  looking  back  upon  this  pe- 
riod ;  "  but  this  is  nothing  to  the  horrors  of 
bankruptcy.  All  the  wealth  of  the  Rothschilds 
would  be  a  poor  recompense  for  a  five  years* 
struggle  with  the  consciousness  that  you  had 
taken  the  money  or  property  of  trusting  friends, 
— promising  to  return  or  pay  for  it  when  re- 
quired,— and  had  betrayed  their  confidence." 
If  others  had  shared  his  sensitive  integrity,  he 
never  would  have  been  obliged  after  a  gallant 
struggle  of  seven  years  to  close  up  the  busi- 
ness, scrupulously  making  good  all  he  owed  to 
subscribers  who  had  paid  in  advance,  and  with 
books  showing  some  ten  thousand  dollars  owed 
to  him  by  delinquents,  men  to  whose  service 
he  had  faithfully  devoted  the  best  years  of  his 
life, — "years, "he  frankly  and  bitterly  says, 
"  that  though  full  of  labor  and  frugal  care 
might  have  been  happy  had  they  not  been 
made  wretched  by  those  men's  dishonesty. 
They  took  my  journal,  and  probably  read  it  ; 
they  promised  to  pay  for  it,  and  defaulted  ; 
leaving  me  to  pay  my  paper-maker,  type-found- 
er, journeymen,  etc.,  as  I  could.  My  only 
requital  was  a  sorely  achieved  but  wholesome 
lesson."  He  had  been  burned  out  in  the  great 
Ann  Street  fire,  in  August,  1835,  and  rejoiced 
to  save  only  his  books.  But  in  the  complete 
destruction   of  February,    1845,    it  was   some 


68  HORACE   GREELEY. 

consolation  to  him  that  the  account-books  of 
the  New  Yorker,  which  had  become  a  perpetual 
eyesore,  "  were  at  length  dissolved  in  smoke 
and  flame  and  lost  to  sight  forever." 

One  thing  which  added  to  his  embarrass- 
nrients  and  anxieties  was  that,  encouraged  by 
the  early  prospects  of  his  paper,  he  had  married, 
in  July,  1836,  and  become  a  family  man.  The 
lady  of  his  choice  was  a  Miss  Mary  Y.  Cheney, 
a  "Yankee  school-mistress,"  whose  acquaint- 
ance he  had  formed  at  his  New  York  boarding- 
house  before  she  went  to  teach  at  Warrenton, 
N.  C.  She  was  a  lady  of  great  and  even  brill- 
iant intellectual  accomplishments,  but  unfortu- 
nately too  much  like  him  in  eccentricity  and 
"  ideas"  to  serve  as  a  corrector  of  his  least 
felicitous  peculiarities  of  life  and  thought. 

The  fact  was  that  the  New  Yorker  was  too 
good  for  its  day,  being  conducted  on  a  literary 
and  moral  standard,  which  prevented  it  from 
attracting  "  the  million."  Its  editorials  were 
sedate  and  dignified  essays  upon  topics  of  pub- 
lic interest  like  the  currency,  international  copy- 
right, usury  laws,  overtrading,  public  lands, 
poor-relief,  labor,  capital  punishment,  and 
foreign  relations.  It  was  also  singularly  modest 
in  its  self-assertion  and  self-advertisement. 

The  New  Yorker  from  the  start  gave  Mr. 
Greeley  a  wide  and  high  repute  as  a  journalist. 


INCIPIENT  JOURNALISM.  69 

One  of  the  first  practical  outcomes  of  it  was  an 
unexpected  visit,  in  the  autumn  of  1838,  from 
two  gentlemen  of  Albany,  who  announced 
themselves  as  Mr.  Thurlow  Weed  and  Mr. 
Lewis  Benedict.  The  former  was  the  editor 
of  the  Albany  Evening  Jonrnal  and  the  latter 
was  the  Chairman  of  the  Whig  State  Corn- 
mittee.  They  had  been  impressed  for  several 
months  by  the  extent  and  accuracy  of  the  po- 
litical information  contained  in  the  New 
Yorker^  as  well  as  the  interest  which  that  pa- 
per imparted  to  the  dryest  statistics  ;  and  it 
had  occurred  to  them  that  he  would  be  just 
the  editor  for  the  campaign  paper  which  the 
Committee  were  about  to  estabhsh  for  the 
discussion  and  enforcement  of  the  burning 
questions  of  the  hour,  such  as  the  Tariff  and 
the  United  States  Bank.  It  was  specially  de- 
signed to  intensify  the  great  Whig  revival, 
which  had  already  swept  the  State  in  1837,  '^"^ 
the  impending  campaign  of  1838, — all  prelimi- 
nary to  the  ousting  of  Mr.  Van  Buren  and  his 
party  from  the  Federal  offices  in  the  great  cam- 
paign of  1840.  Of  course  the  political  inter- 
ests and  aspirations  of  the  young  and  rising 
William  H.  Seward  lay,  in  the  mind  of  these 
men,  behind  it  all.  Though  professedly  neu- 
tral as  a  paper,  the  leanings  of  the  editor  of 
the  New  Yorker  could  not  be  mistaken. 

They  found  Mr.   Greeley  in  his  "  editorial 


yo  HORACE   GREELEY. 

attic"  working  at  his  printer's  case,  "  a  young 
man  with  h'ght  hair  and  eyes,  and  fair  but  fresh 
complexion. "  During  the  ensuing  conversation 
of  about  ten  minutes  he  stood  leaning  on  his 
case,  holding  the  composing-stick  in  his  hand. 
Having  made  the  proposition,  Mr.  Weed  in- 
vited him  to  dine  with  Mr.  Benedict  and  him- 
self at  the  City  Hotel,  leaving  him  several 
hours  to  think  over  the  proposition.  Mr. 
Greeley  was  greatly  gratified  at  his  selection 
and  at  the  kind  of  work  before  him — for  poli- 
tics was  always  his  passion  and  delight — and 
the  whole  scheme  of  the  paper  was  arranged 
before  they  left  the  dinner-table  that  evening. 
It  was,  at  his  suggestion,  to  be  called  The 
Jeffersonian^  and  was  to  be  a  small  octavo,  is- 
sued weekly  for  a  year  at  the  nominal  price 
of  fifty  cents  per  annum, — the  expense  to  be 
borne  by  a  syndicate  of  wealthy  or  zealous 
Whigs.  The  editor's  salary  he  left  to  be  fixed 
by  the  Committee  for  what  it  should  prove  to 
be  worth  ;  it  was  afterward  placed  at  one 
thousand  dollars. 

This  was  a  turning-point  in  Mr.  Greeley's 
career,  determining  his  future  as  a  champion 
political  fighter,  and  his  ultimate  association 
with  the  firm  of  Seward,  Weed  &  Greeley. 
But  it  was  the  addition  to  his  already  overbur- 
dened shoulders  of  a  heavy  load.  It  obliged 
him  to  the  distracting  task  of  furnishing  the 


INCIPIENT  JOURNALISM.  7 1 

matter  for  two  very  different  papers,  published 
a  hundred  and  fifty  miles  apart,  and  as  a  con- 
sequence to  spend  half  of  each  week  in  sum- 
mer and  nearly  the  whole  week  in  winter  at 
Albany,  with  the  slow  methods  of  intercom- 
munication (especially  when  the  river  was 
frozen  up,  and  no  Hudson  River  Railroad 
built,  so  that  travel  was  by  stage  in  winter,  oc- 
cupying nearly  three  days).  The  first  number 
of  the  Jeffersonian  appeared  in  about  two 
months  (March  3d),  and  the  paper  was  the 
best  ever  published  at  such  a  price.  Besides 
intelligent  and  forcible  editorials  and  a  com- 
plete and  admirable  digest  of  political  intelli- 
gence, it  contained  reports  of  the  ablest 
speeches  in  Congress  and  in  the  Legislature 
(the  latter  often  made  by  himself)  and  a  page 
of  general  news.  The  whole  tone  of  the  pa- 
per was  calm,  and  addressed  to  the  reason, 
rather  than  the  passions.  It  carefully  avoided 
personalities  and  abuse.  Its  circulation  was 
about  fifteen  thousand,  and  it  was  thought  to 
have  contributed  largely  to  the  success  of  the 
Whigs  that  fall  in  New  York  (who  lost  such 
States  as  Maine,  Pennsylvania,  and  Ohio),  and 
to  the  election  of  William  H.  Seward  as  Gov- 
ernor over  William  L.  Marcy.  One  of  the 
most  noteworthy  events  v/hich  it  reported  and 
commented  upon  was  the  tragic  duel  between 
Mr.  Graves,   of  Kentucky,  and   Mr.   Cilley,  of 


72  HORACE   GREELEY. 

Maine,  resulting  in  the  death  of  the  latter — 
the  public  horror  at  which  event  was  a  chief 
cause  of  the  suppression  of  that  barbarian 
practice  in  the  North. 

Then  followed  the  famous  campaign  of  1840, 
preliminary  to  which  Mr.  Greeley,  with  great 
pain  and  depression,  was  induced  by  Mr.  Weed 
to  relinquish  the  desire  of  his  heart  for  the 
nomination  of  Henry  Clay,  and  to  advocate 
that  of  General  William  Henry  Harrison  on  the 
score  of  availability.  He  threw  himself  into 
the  canvass  with  all  the  elan  and  heat  of  that 
marvellous  campaign.  Greeley  was  again 
chosen  to  publish  and  edit  a  campaign  paper, 
thoug-h  on  his  own  account.  In  accordance 
with  the  spirit  and  watchwords  of  the  canvass, 
it  was  named  the  Log-Cabin.  This  watchword 
arose  from  a  scoffing  remark  of  a  Democratic 
journalist,  alluding  to  General  Harrison's  living 
for  several  years  after  his  removal  to  Ohio  in  a 
log-house,  then  and  always  a  poor  man. 
"  Give  him  a  log-cabin  and  a  barrel  of  hard 
cider,  and  he  will  be  content  without  the 
Presidency,"  was  the  taunt,  which  the  Whigs 
immediately  took  up  and  made  the  w\ar-cry  of 
the  struggle.  The  whole  canvass  was  a  pro- 
longed hurrah,  especially  by  its  singing,  which 
rose  into  a  kind  of  frenzy.  Many  of  these 
songs  were  first  published  in  the  Log-Cabin ^ 
the  editor  himself  furnishing   two.      He  thor- 


INCIPIENT  JOURNALISM.  73 

oughly  appreciated  the  "music"  as  an  elec- 
tioneering element,  and  writes  to  Mr.  Weed  that 
that  gentleman  is  the  only  opponent  of  them. 
"  I  am  sure,"  he  says,  "  that  nothing  takes 
better  or  gives  a  better  sale  to  the  paper.  Our 
songs  are  doing  more  good  than  anything  else. 
I  know  the  music  is  not  worth  much,  but  at- 
tracts the  attention  even  of  those  who  do  not 
know  a  note.  Really,  I  think  every  song  is 
good  for  five  hundred  new  subscribers."  He 
also,  says  Mr.  Weed,  while  he  did  not  person- 
ally partake  of  "  hard  cider"  libations,  sound- 
ed the  praises  of  that  popular  beverage,  and 
was  even  heard  often  melodiously  celebrating 
with  his  own  lips  the  virtues  of  **  Tippecanoe 
and  Tyler,  too."  In  fact,  everything  was 
Tippecanoe,  the  name  being  stamped  upon  in- 
numerable flags,  badges,  handkerchiefs,  and 
medals,  as  well  as  almanacs  and  song-books  ; 
even  articles  of  trade  and  the  toilet  were  thus 
christened.  Those  of  our  readers  who  did  not 
pass  through  that  campaign  will  never  know 
what  a  carnival  and  a  frenzy  an  election  can 
be. 

The  Log-Cabin  was  a  weekly  of  small  size, 
published  both  at  Albany  and  New  York  at 
fifty  cents  for  six  months  (May  ist  to  Novem- 
ber 1st),  or  fifteen  copies  for  five  dollars.  It 
was  the  veritable  key-note  of  the  campaign, 
and  its  success  was  immediate  and  immense. 


74  HORACE    GREELEY. 

Forty-eight  thousand  of  the  first  number  were 
sold,  the  types  having  to  be  re-set  after  they 
were  distributed.  The  circulation  rose  as 
high,  in  subsequent  numbers,  as  eighty  or  nine- 
ty thousand,  and  the  only  limitation  seemed  to 
be  in  the  lack  of  facilities  for  printing,  mailing, 
and  conveyance  to  the  ends  of  the  land.  It 
was  a  prodigious  labor  for  Mr.  Greeley,  obliged 
to  publish  as  well  as  edit  both  it  and  the  New 
Yorker,  through  the  timidity  and  withdrawal 
of  his  partners.  It  included  in  its  contents  not 
only  songs,  editorials,  paragraphs,  news,  jeii 
d' esprit s  of  every  kind,  but  wood-cuts  to  ac- 
company the  life  and  battle  scenes  of  General 
Harrison  and  the  songs,  the  portraits  of  the 
candidates,  and  often  coarse  but  effective  cari- 
catures. Old  Tippecanoe  was  served  up  in 
every  form  of  laudation  and  defence,  and 
**  Matty  Van"  (Buren)  on  every  sort  of  scath- 
ing gridiron. 

And  yet,  notwithstanding  the  herculean  la- 
bors of  those  days  (for  besides  his  paper,  Mr. 
Greeley  was  constantly  in  demand  as  a  speaker, 
a  committee-man,  and  general  adviser  and 
suggester),  and  notwithstanding  that  he  made 
little  or  no  money  by  it  and  was  heavily  in 
debt  for  the  New  Yorker,  he  was  in  his  element 
and  thoroughly  enjoyed  his  work.  He  gave 
each  subscriber  an  extra  number,  containing 
the    results  of    the    election,    and  after   that, 


INCIPIENT  JOURNALISM.  75 

continued  the  paper  for  a  full  year  longer,  with 
a  circulation  of  about  ten  thousand,  barely 
paying  the  cost  of  production,  counting  his  work 
as  editor  nothing.  The  number  for  April  3d, 
1841,  contained  the  sad  and  fateful  announce- 
ment of  President  Harrison's  death. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

THE  TRIBUNE. 

All  these  years  of  toil  and  bitter  experience 
had  been  preparing  our  hero  for  the  great  and 
culminating  work  of  his  life.  As  he  said  of 
himself  thirty  years  after  this  time,  "  Half  my 
life  has  been  devoted  to  the  Tribune,  and  the 
former  half  to  preparation  for^it. "  Especially 
had  he  been  fitted  for  it  by  his  editorial  expe- 
riences. The  New  Yorkery  the  Jeffersonian, 
and  the  Log-Cabin  had  shown  his  versatility  and 
capacity  for  conducting  all  parts  of  a  family 
newspaper — the  literary,  the  political,  the  news, 
and  the  miscellaneous  departments — with  equal 
and  extraordinary  ability. 

The  times,  too,  were  propitious.  The  great 
national  victory  of  the  Whigs,  a  few  months  be- 
fore, sent  the  little  craft  out  upon  the  top  wave 
of  both  personal  and  party  popularity.  The 
only  "  live"  papers  in  New  York  were  the  Sun 
and  Herald.  The  first  was  not  then  a  strong 
paper,  and  the  Herald  was  an  offence  in  the 
nostrils  of  respectable  people  for  its  scurrility 
and  indecency,  and  there  was  a  wide  demand 
for  a  journal  of  ability  and  purity  which  at  the 


THE   TRIBUNE.  // 

same  time  should  be  enterprising,  and  ample 
in  its  information.  The  two  papers  above 
mentioned,  though  nominally  neutral,  were  in 
unmistakable  sympathy  with  the  Democratic 
Party,  and  the  Whigs  felt  the  need  of  one 
which,  while  independent  and  unsubsidied, 
should  be  in  hearty  unison  with  their  doc- 
trines and  movements,  and  should  be  especially 
adapted  to  the  cause  of  the  laboring  class.  Mr. 
Greeley,  of  all  men  living,  seemed  to  combine 
all  these  qualifications.  His  capital  consisted  of 
his  brains,  experience,  and  reputation  ;  and  the 
only  pecuniary  assistance  received  was  a  loan  of 
one  thousand  dollars  from  Mr.  Coggeshall, 
which  was  duly  repaid,  principal  and  interest. 
Even  the  friendly  offers  of  Mr.  Dudley  S. 
Gregory,  who  had  loaned  him  one  thousand 
dollars  on  the  New  Yorker y  were  declined  with 
thanks.  A  journalistic  critic,  none  too  favor- 
able, says  that  the  Tribune  sought  and  succeed- 
ed in  finding  its  place  between  the  extremes  of 
dull  respectability  and  bold  independency  ;  of 
portentous  heaviness  and  unsubstantial  froth. 

The  prospectus  of  the  new  paper  was  issued 
in  the  Log-Cabin  of  April  3d,  1841,  announcing 
the  appearance  on  a  week  from  that  day  of 
"  the  first  number  of  a  new  morning  journal  of 
politics,  literature,  and  general  intelligence." 
It  would  **  contain  the  news  by  the  morning's 
Southern  mail,  which  is  contained  in  no  other 


78  HORACE   GREELEY. 

penny  paper."  It  would  be  published  on  "  a  fair 
royal  sheet  (size  of  t\\Q  Log- Cabin) y'*  and  served 
to  city  subscribers  "  at  the  low  price  of  one 
penny  per  copy  ;  mail  subscribers,  four  dollars 
per  annum."  As  to  its  objects  and  spirit,  the 
Tribune,  as  its  name  imported,  would  labor  to 
advance  the  interests  of  the  people,  moral,  so- 
cial, and  political.  It  would  be  free  from 
"  the  immoral  and  degrading  police  reports, 
advertisements,  and  other  matter,  which  have 
been  allowed  to  disgrace  the  columns  of  our 
leading  penny  papers,"  and  no  exertion  would 
be  spared  to  make  it  both  a  fit  and  a  welcome 
"  visitant  at  the  family  fireside. ' '  As  to  politics, 
it  promised  the  new  Administration  "  a  frank 
and  cordial,  but  manly  and  independent  sup- 
port, judging  it  always  by  its  acts,  and  com- 
mending those  only  so  far  as  they  shall  seem 
calculated  to  subserve  the  great  end  of  all 
government — the  welfare  of  the  people."  His 
leading  idea  (as  he  says  elsewhere)  was  the  es- 
tablishment of  a  journal  '*  removed  alike  from 
servile  partisanship  on  the  one  hand  and  from 
gagged  and  mincing  neutrality  on  the  other." 
This  advertisement  was  signed  "  Horace  Gree- 
ley, 30  Ann  Street." 

Alas  !  so  far  as  the  political  pledge  and  out- 
look were  concerned,  the  Tribune  published  in 
its  very  first  number  the  death  of  President 
Harrison,  six  days  before,  which  soon  arrayed 


THE   TRIBUNE.  79 

it  in  the  opposition  to  the  recreant  Tyler.  It 
was  also  soon  found  necessary  to  raise  the  price 
to  two  cents,  or  it  would  have  shared  the  fate 
of  Dr.  Shepard's  Morning  Post.  Out  of  the 
twelve  papers  then  published  in  New  York, 
six — the  American,  Journal  of  Commerce  y 
Courier  and  Encjnircr,  Express y  Commercial 
Advertiser,  and  Evening  Post — were  published 
at  ten  dollars  a  year.  The  Herald  cost  two 
cents.  The  only  successful  penny  paper  was 
the  Sun,  which  owed  its  success  chiefly  to  its 
pandering  to  the  lowest  tastes  of  the  people  in 
the  way  of  advertisements  and  news. 

The  Tribune  duly  appeared  on  Saturday, 
April  loth.  A  fac-simile  of  the  first  page 
lies  before  me,  the  title  in  the  same  kind  of 
letter  as  the  Tribune  of  to-day.  It  was  ap- 
propriately headed  with  the  dying  words  of 
President  Harrison  as  a  motto  :  "  /  desire  you 
to  understand  the  true  principles  of  the  Govern- 
7nent.  I  wish  them  carried  out.  ...  /  ask 
nothing  more."  The  entire  first  page  looks  dry 
enough,  being  occupied  by  the  "  opinion  of 
Willis  Hall,  attorney-general,  on  the  legality  of 
the  conduct  of  Robert  H.  Morris,  Recorder  of 
the  city  of  New  York."  The  fledgling  journal 
was  one  third  the  size  of  the  present  Tribune, 
and  began  with  six  hundred  subscribers.  It 
was  a  day  of  "  most  unseasonable  chill  and 
sleet  and  snow,"  and,  moreover,  of  the  great 


8o  HORACE   GREELEY. 

funeral  parade  and  pageant  in  honor  of  the 
dead  President,  the  grand  marshal  of  which 
died  from  exposure.  Mr.  Greeley  designates 
it  as  a  "  leaden,  funereal  morning,  the  most  in- 
hospitable of  the  year."  The  edition  of  five 
thousand,  which  was  printed,  it  was  found  diffi- 
cult even  to  give  away.  The  prospect  was  not 
a  propitious  one  to  Mr.  Greeley,  who  so  thor- 
oughly realized  that  his  whole  career  was  de- 
pendent on  this  venture,  that  he  is  said  to  have 
sat  up  all  the  preceding  night  in  a  state  of 
nervous  anxiety,  making  frequent  changes, 
and  "  never  leaving  the  form  till  he  saw  it, 
complete  and  safe,  upon  the  press."  Nor  did 
the  prospect  improve  when,  at  the  end  of  the 
first  week,  he  found  that  his  expenses  had 
been  five  hundred  and  twenty-five  dollars  and 
his  receipts  ninety-two  dollars. 

But  Horace  Greeley  was  then  thirty  years 
old,  in  the  prime  of  health  and  vigor,  with  un- 
equalled qualifications  and  experience  ;  with 
almost  exhaustless  pluck  and  "staying  power  ;" 
with  a  national  reputation  and  popularity  ;  and 
with  such  assistants  as  Henry  J.  Raymond 
(afterward  the  founder  of  the  Times),  who  was 
one  of  a  thousand  ;  and  George  M.  Snow  as 
the  "  Wall  Street"  editor,  a  position  which 
he  held  till  1863.  Above  all,  he  was  saved  by 
the  offer  of  Thomas  McElrath,  in  about  three 
months,  to  enter  into  partnership  with  a  con- 


THE   TRIBUNE.  8l 

siderable  capital,  and  to  take  entire  charge  of 
its  business  management, — for  which  Mr.  Gree- 
ley was  specially  unfitted,  and  which  no  man 
could  conduct  successfully  in  combination 
with  the  editing. 

Even  more  than  by  anything  else  was  the 
immediate  success  of  the  Tribune  secured  by 
a  conspiracy  concocted  by  the  Sim  to  crush 
it.  Herein  the  one-cent  beginning  was  a  for- 
tunate move,  since  it  furnished  twice  the  read- 
ing matter  and  the  latest  news  for  the  same 
price  as  the  Sun,  and  consequently  drew  heav- 
ily upon  the  patrons  of  that  paper,  and  filled 
its  proprietor  with  a  panic  for  its  very  exist- 
ence. The  methods  used  were  as  dastardly  as 
they  were  audacious  :  an  unsuccessful  attempt 
was  made  to  bribe  the  carriers  of  the  new  pa- 
per to  give  up  their  routes  ;  the  newsmen  were 
threatened  with  the  loss  of  the  Sun  if  they 
sold  the  Tribune.  Even  the  newsboys  of  the 
former  were  set  up  to  whip  those  of  the  latter 
off  the  field,  whereupon  the  young  men  of  the 
office  were  detailed  to  protect  the  boys  of  the 
Tribune.  Even  the  editor  of  the  Sun  himself, 
with  a  man  in  his  employ,  became  personally 
engaged  in  this  noble  fray. 

Of  course  the  general  public  could  not  be 
content  without  taking  its  Briarean  part  in  this 
scrimmage,  which  became  at  once  the  excite- 
ment of  the  town.     Besides  being  a  magnificent 


82  HORACE    GREELEY. 

advertisement  of  the  new  journal,  the  popular 
instinct  of  fair  play,  and  of  sympathy  with  the 
"  under  dog,"  combined  with  the  real  merits 
of  the  paper  to  run  up  its  subscription  list  at 
the  rate  of  three  hundred  a  day.  By  the  end 
of  the  first  week  thereafter  its  paid-up  sub- 
scribers amounted  to  two  thousand,  and  by  the 
seventh  week  the  utmost  limit  of  its  publisher's 
capacity  was  reached — at  eleven  thousand.  At 
the  start  it  owned  type,  but  no  presses,  and 
had  to  hire  the  press-work  done  by  the  "  to- 
ken." The  folding  and  mailing  would  have 
"  staggered"  Mr.  Greeley,  had  it  not  been 
that  its  earlier  subscribers  were  mostly  served 
by  carriers  in  the  city.  The  income  increased 
more  rapidly  than  the  expenses,  and  its  ad- 
vertisements went  up  from  four  to  thirteen 
columns  in  the  one  hundredth  number,  and 
from  four  to  six  cents  a  line,  so  that  it  was  al- 
most necessary  to  cry  "  hold,  enough  !" — at 
least,  to  beg  indulgence  for  necessary  delays 
till  new  presses  capable  of  printing  thirty-five 
hundred  copies  an  hour  could  be  procured. 
In  September  a  weekly  edition  was  issued,  into 
which  the  New  Yorker  and  the  Log-Cabin  were 
merged,  and  which  became  the  most  widely 
circulated  paper  in  the  United  States — running 
up  to  hundreds  of  thousands,  and  charging 
from  two  to  five  dollars  a  line  for  advertisements 
— carrying  the  influence  of  the  Tribiuie  and  its 


THE   TRIBUNE.  83 

editor  into  the  rural  districts  and  into  the  most 
remote  corners  of  the  land  ;  and  thus  educat- 
ing the  yeomanry  of  the  country  for  that  great 
anti-slavery  struggle,  which  the  accession  of 
John  Tyler  to  the  Presidency  warmed  into  life, 
by  the  incipient  movements  of  his  Administra- 
tion for  the  acquisition  of  Texas  and  other 
slave  territory  in  the  Southwest. 

This  speedy  and  enormous  progress  was 
aided  by  occasional  feats  of  triumphant  news- 
gathering  and  reporting  over  its  rivals  ;  by  its 
openness  to  novelties  and  sensations  in  the 
world  of  thought  ;  by  its  superior  literary  de- 
partment and  selections  ;  by  the  great  ability 
of  its  political  discussions  and  the  exactness 
and  fulness  of  its  political  intelligence  ;  and  by 
its  system  of  premiums  for  new  subscribers, 
from  a  notable  strawberry  plant  or  Mr.  Gree- 
ley's portrait,  to  the  "  American  Conflict"  for 
clubs.  Special  offers  were  also  made  for  po- 
litical campaigns,  even  as  low  as  a  dollar  a 
copy  for  a  year  to  clubs  of  fifty  or  more.  The 
second  volume  increased  the  price  to  two  cents, 
or  nine  cents  a  week,  without  losing  an  appre- 
ciable number  of  its  subscribers.  At  the  close 
of  that  volume  the  circulation  was  twenty 
thousand,  and  its  advertising  business  obliged 
it  to  issue  frequent  supplements,  and  at  a  later 
date  even  to  omit  advertisements.  In  1847  ^ 
dispute  arose  with  the  Herald  on  the  question 


84  HORACE   GREELEY. 

of  comparative  circulation,  whereupon  the 
Tribune  challenged  that  paper  to  an  investiga- 
tion, which  was  accepted.  The  losing  party 
was  to  pay  two  hundred  dollars  to  two  orphan 
asylums.  The  result  showed  a  difference  in 
favor  of  the  Herald  oi  less  than  seven  hundred 
on  its  entire  circulation  of  all  kinds,  including 
its  Presidential  Herald^  of  about  that  num- 
ber. The  Tribime  had  now  a  semi -weekly 
edition  of  nine  hundred  and  sixty.  Its  editor 
protested  against  counting  in  the  Sunday  Her- 
aldj  which  did  not  come  within  the  scope  of 
its  competition.  The  public  took  a  great  in- 
terest in  the  contest,  which  was  a  fine  adver- 
tisement for  both  papers,  and  which  was  a 
special  benefit  to  the  Tribune  in  the  lesson  it 
learned  in  newspaper  book-keeping  from  the 
inspection  of  its  rival's  books. 

Other  and  more  honorable  "  Battles  of  the 
Giants"  were  waged  for  the  palm  of  enterprise 
in  getting  news,  especially  election  returns,  in 
advance  of  rivals.  Carrier  pigeons  were  trained 
to  fly  from  Halifax  or  Boston  to  Wall  Street 
with  the  news  under  their  wings.  Pony  ex- 
presses were  run,  and  even  locomotives,  for 
which  high  prices  were  paid  for  right  of  way. 
A  gentleman  connected  with  the  Tribune  tells 
of  the  arrival  of  a  heated  and  dusty  messenger, 
one  election-night,  from  some  small  but  repre- 
sentative  place  at  the  end  of  Long  Island  at 


THE   TRIBUNE.  85 

the  rate  of  sixty-five  miles  an  hour  by  special 
engine.  **  The  yell  of  joy,"  he  says,  **  which 
Greeley  uttered  when  he  saw  the  returns  might 
have  been  heard  a  quarter  of  a  mile."  Not 
always  so  honorable  was  the  competition, 
however,  for  the  same  gentleman  tells  of  a 
Tribune  messenger  who,  having  gathered  up 
the  news  in  a  distant  part  of  the  country,  ran 
away  with  it  on  an  engine  which  was  waiting 
for  the  Herald' s  man.  This  of  course  was  a 
piece  of  enterprise  by  the  messenger  on  his 
own  account.  Printers  were  set  to  work  on 
the  Hudson  River  boats,  who  would  have  an 
important  speech  in  type  on  arriving  at  New 
York.  Such  a  feat  was  performed  by  Henry 
J.  Raymond,  in  writing  out  his  shorthand  notes 
on  the  Boston  night-boat  of  one  of  Daniel 
Webster's  great  speeches,  and  handing  them 
over  page  by  page  to  a  corps  of  printers,  so 
that  by  five  o'clock  in  the  morning  the  report, 
comprising  several  columns  of  the  Tribune^  was 
in  type,  and  in  print  by  six  o'clock. 

The  Herald  was  unquestionably  ahead  of  its 
rivals  on  the  whole,  especially  in  getting  the 
news  from  Europe,  by  means  of  such  expe- 
dients as  those  mentioned  above,  its  own  news- 
boats  and  expresses  from  Boston,  and  with  the 
assistance  of  the  New  York  pilots.  According- 
ly the  Tribune,  Sun,  and  Joiiriial  of  Commerce 
organized  a  gigantic  conspiracy  with  leading 


S6  HORACE    GREELEY. 

papers  in  Boston,  Philadelphia,  Baltimore,  and 
Washington  to  overwhelm  that  naughty  and 
clever  paper  with  defeat.  A  pilot-boat,  the 
William  J.  Romer,  of  about  fifty  tons,  was 
despatched  from  New  York  on  February  loth, 
1846,  and  arrived  at  Cork  after  a  voyage  of 
great  peril  and  discomfort  on  March  7th.  It 
had  been  expected  that  this  notedly  fast  boat 
would  be  ready  to  leave  Liverpool  on  its  return 
trip  on  February  26th  or  27th, — another  vessel 
of  the  same  kind  having  crossed  in  eighteen 
days,  including  three  days'  detention  by  a 
storm  ;  so  that  this  part  of  the  plan  was  a  to- 
tal failure,  for  the  Cambria  from  Liverpool 
could  not  now  be  overtaken.  The  special  ob- 
ject was  to  get  tidings  concerning  the  Oregon 
boundary  question,  which  was  then  expected 
to  produce  war  between  this  country  and  Eng- 
land. 

Through  the  ill-concealed  confidence  and 
glee  of  the  conspirators,  and  treachery  some- 
where, the  editor  of  the  Herald  got  wind  of 
the  expedition.  His  successful  method  of  de- 
feating it  was  to  arouse  the  spirit  of  Captain 
Judkins  of  the  steamship  Cambria,  on  whose 
easy-going  deliberateness,  and  that  of  the  Cu- 
nard  Line,  the  hopes  of  the  conspirators  were 
now  dependent.  "Is  an  express  to  beat  me 
to  Boston  ?"  exclaimed  the  doughty  captain. 
"  I'll  see  about  that  !"     The  result  was  that 


THE    TRIBUNE.  -  8/ 

the  Cambria  made  the  run  to  Boston  in  thirty- 
six  hours  after  touching  at  Halifax.  A  fast 
steamer  owned  by  Commodore  Vanderbilt,  who 
enjoyed  the  sport  in  characteristic  spirit,  was 
chartered  and  equipped  with  two  of  his  best 
captains,  to  receive  the  Herald  messenger  at 
-Allyn's  Point,  on  the  Worcester  and  Norwich 
Railroad,  and  convey  him  across  the  Sound  to 
Greenport,  whence  he  should  proceed  by  the 
Long  Island  Railroad  to  New  York — all  rail- 
road travel,  of  course,  being  by  special  loco- 
motive. All  went  well  ;  the  messenger  made 
the  trip  from  Boston  in  eight  and  a  half  hours, 
beating  the  combination  express  five  and  a  half 
hours.  The  Tribune  contended  that  it  was 
only  three  hours.  When  the  latter  passed  the 
Herald  ofifice  the  streets  were  swarming  with 
newsboys  crying  its  extras.  The  ill-fated  Ro- 
mer  was  actually  beaten  by  two  successive 
packet  ships  which  had  passed  her  on  the  way, 
bearing  the  usual  anticipatory  news  to  the 
Herald^  whose  editor  took  pains  to  send  his 
compliments  to  Mr.  Greeley. 

Early  in  the  second  year  of  the  Tribuney 
offence  was  taken  by  the  notorious  Mike 
Walsh,  of  the  "  Bloody  Sixth"  Ward,  and  his 
*'  Spartan  Band,"  resulting  in  a  general  riot  of 
the  Irish  population  of  that  vicinity,  by  its  dis- 
passionate account  of  their  lawlessness  and 
rowdyism  on  election-day.      Persons  called  on 


88  HORACE    GREELEY. 

two  successive  days,  and  violently  demanded 
that  certain  statements'  should  be  retracted  ; 
and  on  no  notice  being  taken  of  this  by  the 
editor,  they  left  behind  them  a  threat  to  come 
next  day  with  the  whole  Sixth  Ward,  if  no  re- 
traction was  made,  and  "  smash"  the  office. 
The  only  result  was  a  fuller  and  more  severe- 
statement  on  the  third  day,  and  a  general 
preparation  to  meet  the  expected  mob  with 
musketry  from  the  armed  employes,  including 
the  editor,  who  seemed  to  be  quite  unconscious 
of  any  danger.  Hot  water  from  the  steam- 
pipes,  and  brick-bats  from  the  roof  were  ar- 
ranged for.  But  probably  the  threatening 
assailants  got  word  of  the  preparations,  and 
regarded  the  storming  of  a  fortress  as  out  of 
their  line  ;  at  any  rate,  none  appeared,  and  the 
Tribune  abated  not  a  jot  of  its  fidelity  and 
plainness  of  speech,  nor  the  "  Bloody  Sixth" 
a  tittle  of  its  ruffianism  and  election  irregulari- 
ties. 

Quite  a  different  attempt  to  smash  the  7>/- 
biine,  and  from  a  very  different  quarter,  were  the 
great  libel  suits  of  the  celebrated  though  iras- 
cible J.  Fenimore  Cooper,  whose  personal 
popularity  was  in  an  inverse  ratio  to  that  of  his 
novels.  In  those  days  it  had  not  become  a 
settled  thing  that  the  newspaper  is  a  "  char- 
tered libertine,"  and  that  to  expect  a  verdict 
against  it  is  to  have  the   daring   of  a   forlorn 


THE   TRIBUNE.  89 

hope  or  of  the  six  hundred  who  rode  into  the 
"jaws  of  hell"  at  Balaklava.  In  1833,  Mr. 
Cooper,  having  returned  to  his  paternal  acres 
at  Cooperstown  after  a  long  residence  abroad, 
in  which  he  had  incurred  the  general  detestation 
of  the  English  press,  selected  for  his  entertain- 
ment the  singular  sport  of  hunting  down  the 
Whig  papers  of  this  country  for  their  unfriend- 
ly criticisms  of  himself  and  his  books,  stimu- 
lated as  the  latter  were  by  his  persistent  and 
sarcastic  attacks,  as  far  back  as  1832,  upon  the 
press.  The  most  stinging  of  these  was  in 
"  Homeward  Bound"  and  "  Home  as  Found," 
in  which  he  pictured  a  typical  American  editor 
in  "  Steadfast  Dodge"  of  the  Active  Inquirer^ 
combining  every  baser  quality  of  human  na- 
ture :  he  was  **  a  sneak,  a  spy,  a  coward,  a 
demagogue,  a  parasite,  a  lickspittle,  a  fawner 
upon  all  from  whom  he  hoped  help,  a  slan- 
derer of  all  who  did  not  care  to  endure  his  so- 
ciety." A  specimen  of  the  "  tit  for  tat"  with 
which  this  sort  of  thing  was  returned  was 
published  in  the  New  Yorker  of  December  ist, 
1838,  probably  by  Park  Benjamin  :  "  He  is 
as  proud  of  blackguarding  as  a  fish-woman  of 
Billingsgate.  It  is  as  natural  to  him  as  snarl- 
ing to  a  tom-cat,  or  growling  to  a  bull-dog. 
He  is  the  common  mark  of  scorn  and  contempt 
of  every  well-informed  American — the  super- 
lative dolt  !"     His  first   suit   was   against   the 


90  HORACE    GREELEY. 

local  paper,  followed  by  suits  against  the  New 
York  Courier  atid  Enquirer,  Commercial  Adver- 
tiser, Albany  Evening  Journal,  and  other  lead- 
ing papers,  who  took  up  the  cudgels  for  their 
contemporary. 

The  turn  of  the    Tribune  came  upon  its  pub- 
lication, on   November   17th,   1S41,  of  a  letter 
from  Mr.  Thurlow  Weed,  of  the  Evening  Jour- 
7ial,  describing  a  case  in  which  he  had  recently 
been  worsted.     The  trial  was  held  at  Ballston, 
near  Saratoga,   on   the  succeeding  9th  of  De- 
cember.    A  peculiarity  of  these  cases  was  that 
Mr.  Cooper,  aided  by  his  son,  appeared  as  his 
own   counsel,  and   that    Mr.  Greeley  also   con- 
ducted his  own   defence.     Previous  and  later 
trials  brought  in  many  of  the  leading  lawyers 
of  the  State,  such  as  Joshua  A.  Spencer,  Am- 
brose L.  Jordan,  Daniel  Cady,  and  William  H. 
Seward.      No  witnesses  were  called,  the  publi- 
cation   being    admitted    and    the    editor's    re- 
sponsibility   accepted.      The    presiding    Judge 
Willard,   after  speeches  by  the  defendant  and 
the  Messrs.  Cooper,  delivered  what  Mr.  Gree- 
ley called  a  **  bullying"  charge    against    him. 
The  result  was  a  verdict  against  him  of  two 
hundred  dollars  with  costs.     On  his  return  to 
New  York  he  had  his  satisfaction  in  a  report 
of  eleven  columns  for  the  Tribune  of  the  next 
day,  embodying  the  main  points  of  liis  forcible 
and  eloquent  speech  of  fifty  minutes  in  length. 


THE   TRIBUNE.  9I 

"  This  was  intended,"  he  says,  "  to  be  good- 
natured,  perhaps  even  humorous,  and  some 
thought  I  succeeded  ;  but  Fenimore  seems  not 
to  have  concurred  in  that  opinion,  for  he  sued 
me  upon  the  report  as  a  new  libel — or,  rather, 
as  several  libels."  Mr.  Greeley,  though  his 
firm  belief  was  that  he  could  have  done  better 
in  the  long  run  by  "  simply  attending  in  per- 
son and  briefly  stating  the  material  facts  to  the 
jury,"  had  not  the  time  to  be  his  own  lawyer 
in  this  second  protracted  struggle,  and  em- 
ployed Messrs.  Seward  and  A.  B.  Conger,  who 
succeeded  in  postponing  the  case  till  Mr. 
Cooper's  death,  so  that  it  never  came  to  trial. 
It  did  not  stop  Mr.  Greeley's  freedom  of  edi- 
torial comment  on  "  our  friend  Fenimore." 

Mr.  Greeley,  however,  learned  the  lesson  of 
keeping  clear  of  becoming  plaintiff  in  libel  suits. 
Having  been  "  outrageously  libelled,"  as  he 
thought,  by  a  charge  of  having  been  bought 
up  by  some  railroad  company  in  the  West,  he 
impulsively  ordered  suits  to  be  commenced  ; 
but  upon  reflection  he  decided  that  he  could 
neither  afford  to  lose,  nor  to  win  them,  and  glad- 
ly accepted  such  retractions  as  his  libellers  saw 
fit  to  make.  **  Henceforth,"  he  says,  "that 
man  must  very  badly  want  to  be  sued  who 
provokes  me  to  sue  him  for  libel."  At  the 
same  time  (1868),  he  says,  "  I  can  hardly  re- 
member a  time  when  I  was  absolutely  exempt 


92  HORACE   GREELEY. 

from  these  infestations,"  as  defendant.  He 
attributes  it  to  the  fact  of  its  being  "  a  main 
reliance  of  certain  attorneys,  destitute  alike  of 
character  and  law,"  and,  in  this  State,  to  the 
"  perversion  of  the  law  by  our  judges  of  thirty 
or  forty  years  ago. 


CHAPTER  VII. 

THE  TRIBUNE  {continued). 

The  Tribune  suffered  not  a  little,  also,  in 
the  way  of  internecine  war  on  the  part  of  the 
press  itself,  and  in  personal  attacks  upon  its 
editor  for  his  opinions  and  his  peculiarities. 
But  it  was  always  equal  to  the  situation,  whether 
the  assault  came  from  clergymen,  like  Drs.  Potts 
and  Hawks,  or  from  editors,  like  Colonel  Webb, 
Major  Noah,  James  Brooks,  Henry  J.  Ray- 
mond, and  Bennett,  or  the  Sunday  Mercury 
and  the  Plebeian,  and  the  whole  raft  of  the 
Democratic  press.  Horace  Greeley  seemed 
never  more  in  his  element  than  when,  with  his 
back  to  the  wall,  he  called  on  the  various  Mac- 
duffs  about  him  to  **  come  on."  It  must  be 
confessed  that  he  handled  them  not  only  "  with- 
out gloves,"  but  without  fastidiousness  as  to 
the  sharpness  of  his  thrusts  or  the  choice  of 
language.  If  he  called  Raymond  "  the  little 
villain,"  he  impartially  called  Major  Noah  an 
"  old  villain."  Thomas  H.  Benton  also  is  "  an 
unqualified  villain," — the  epithet  was  rather  a 
favorite    one   in    repelling    personal    charges  ; 


94  HORACE    GREELEY. 

also  the  countercharge  of  "  deh'berate,"  or 
"base,"  or  "stupendous,"  or  "paltry  false- 
hood." 

The  Courier  and  Enquirer^  under  Colonel 
Webb  and  Raymond,  was  Mr.  Greeley's  and 
the  Tribune' s  special  and  incessant  belligerent. 
Webb  attacked  the  editor  of  the  Tribune  on 
January  27th,  1844,  as  an  Abolitionist,  a 
"  philosopher,"  and  a  Grahamite,  who  would 
have  all  the  world  live  upon  bran  bread  and 
sawdust,  an  advocate  of  Fourierism  and  other 
"  tomfooleries"  resulting  in  the  vice  and  immo- 
ralities of  Fanny  Wright,  etc.;  at  the  same 
time  claiming  himself  to  be  "a  Christian," 
and  a  contrast  to  all  the  sins  and  weaknesses 
of  Greeley.  He  also  accused  him  of  seek- 
ing notoriety  by  his  eccentricities  and  strange 
theories,  hoping  to  be  accounted  great  "  by 
wandering  through  the  streets  with  a  hat 
double  the  size  of  his  head,  a  coat  after  the 
fashion  of  Jacob's  of  old,  with  one  leg  of  his 
pantaloons  inside  and  the  other  outside  of  his 
boot,  and  with  boots  all  bespattered  with  mud, 
or  possibly  a  shoe  on  one  foot  and  a  boot  on 
the  other,  and  glorying  in  an  unwashed  and 
unshaven  person."  The  article  wound  up  with 
these  words  :  "In  short,  there  is  not  the 
slightest  resemblance  between  the  editor  of  the 
Tribune  and  ourself  politically,  morally,  or  so- 
cially ;  and  it  is  only  when  his  affectation  and 


THE   TRIBUNE.  95 

impudence  are  unbearable,  that  we  condescend 
to  notice  him  or  his  press." 

Horace  Greeley,  in  his  equally  characteristic 
rejoinder  next  day,  admitted  his  "  vegetarian" 
diet  "  mainly  but  not  exclusively  ;"  but  it  was 
his  own  private  affair,  about  which  he  did  not 
trouble  his  readers, — "  why  should  it  concern 
the  colonel  ?"  He  deprecated  that  so  humble 
a  person  as  himself  should  be  made  to  exem- 
plify philosophy,  and  still  more  that  "  Chris- 
tianity is  personified  by  the  hero  of  the  Sun- 
day duel  with  the  Hon.  Tom  Marshall."  As 
regarded  his  personal  appearance,  he  retorted 
with  much  heat  upon  the  "  exaggerated  fool- 
ery" which  had  been  passed  along  by  malicious 
blockheads  of  the  press  from  a  lack  of  ideas, 
till,  "  from  its  origin  in  the  Albany  Microscope^ 
it  has  sunk  down  at  last  to  the  columns  of  the 
Courier  and  Enquirer,''  Yet  all  this  time  he 
had  worn  better  clothes  than  two  thirds  of  his 
assailants,  and  better  than  any  of  them  could 
honestly  wear  if  they  paid  their  debts  (Webb 
was  a  good  deal  of  a  Beau  Brummel  and  a 
Turveydrop)  ;  "while,  if  they  are,  indeed, 
more  cleanly  than  he,  they  must  bathe  very 
thoroughly  not  less  than  twice  each  day.  .  .  . 
That  he  ever  affected  eccentricity  is  most  un- 
true ;  and  certainly  no  costume  he  ever  ap- 
peared in  would  create  such  a  sensation  in 
Broadway  as  that  which  James  "Watson  Webb 


96  HORACE    GREELEY. 

would  have  worn,  but  for  the  ciemency  of 
Governor  Seward" — alluding  to  his  sentence  to 
imprisonment  on  account  of  the  before-men- 
tioned duel.  The  gallant  colonel  dropped  the 
subject,  and  retired  from  the  field  with  rum- 
pled crest. 

At  another  time,  however,  the  Courier  and 
Enquirer  tried  to  excite  the  mob  against  the 
Tribune  and  its  editor  for  its  opposition  to  the 
Mexican  War.  Mr.  Greeley's  reply  pronounces 
it  "  no  new  trick' '  on  the  part  of  that  paper,  and 
quotes  its  incendiary  language  at  the  time  of  the 
great  "  Abolition  riots"  of  1834,  when  a  lawless 
and  furious  mob  held  possession  of  the  city,  as- 
saulting churches,  houses,  and  persons  ;  lan- 
guage which  distinctly  places  the  "  Abolition- 
ists and  Amalgamationists"  "  beyond  the  pale 
of  the  law,"  and  calls  upon  the  city  authorities 
to  "  withdraw  the  aegis  of  the  law"  from  them, 
and  to  make  them  understand  * '  that  they  prose- 
cute their  treasonable  and  beastly  plans  at  tJieir 
own  peril.'''  Mr.  .  Greeley  goes  on  to  say: 
"  Such  is  the  man,  such  the  means  by  which  he 
seeks  to  bully  freemen  out  of  the  rights  of  Free 
Speech  and  Free  Thought.  There  are  those 
who  cower  before  his  threats  and  his  rufifian 
appeals  to  mob  violence, — here  is  one  who  never 
will.  .  .  .  Let  those  who  threaten  us  with  as- 
sassination understand,  once  for  all,  that  we 
pity  while  we  despise  their  baseness."     It  will 


THE   TRIBUNE.  97 

be  seen  from  these  courtesies  between  the  two 
most  high-toned  morning  papers  in  New  York, 
that,  with  all  its  specks  and  spots  of  to-day, 
the  journalistic  world  "  does  move"  in  some 
things  toward  a  greater   "sweetness,"    if  not 

"light." 

Another  controversy,  sufficiently  intense  yet 
well  bred,  and  exhibiting  a  high  order  of  dia- 
lectic ability,  was  the  public  discussion  in  1846 
between  Greeley  of  the  Tribune  and  Raymond 
of  the  Courier  and  Enquirer^  upon  Fourierism, 
the  former  being  the  challenger.  This  lasted 
six  months,  comprising  twelve  articles  on  each 
side,'  attracting  great  attention,  and  afterward 
published  in  pamphlet  form.  We  may  have 
occasion  to  refer  to  this  discussion  elsewhere. 
Suffice  it  now  to  say  that  Mr.  Greeley  did  not 
come  off  second-best  in  the  vigor  and  vivacity 
of  his  style  ;  but  Mr.  Raymond's  inexorable 
appeals  from  theory  to  practice,  his  skill  in 
concentrating  his  attack  upon  the  weak  places 
in  his  opponent's  armor,  and  in  taking  advan- 
tage of  his  admissions  and  reservations,  left  no 
question  where  the  "  prize  for  debate"  should 
be  awarded.  One  thing  is  certain  :  Mr.  Gree- 
ley was  obliged,  toward  the  close,  to  disavow 
for  the  Tribune  any  responsibility  for  Fourier, 
Parke  Godwin,  or  Communistic  immorality, 
and  to  state  its  position  mildly  thus  :  "  What 
the   Tribune  advocates  is,   simply  and   solely, 


98  HORACE    GREELEY. 

such  an  organization  of  society  as  will  secure 
to  every  man  the  opportunity  of  uninterrupted 
and  profitable  labor,  and  to  every  child  nour- 
ishment and  culture."  Moreover,  the  subject 
thenceforth  was  rarely  broached  in  the  Trib- 
2ine^  and  then  only  in  self-defence  from  person- 
alities. The  discussion  undoubtedly  did  good 
in  awakening  the  public  mind  to  the  evils  of 
society,  and  to  those  many  practical  applica- 
tions of  the  principle  of  association  which  are 
already  among  the  great  and  beneficent  features 
of  our  new  civilization. 

One  of  these  applications  was  tried  in  the 
Tribuneo^CQ  itself  in  1846, — the  origination  of 
what  is  now  probably  the  method  of  managing 
all  our  large  papers.  The  plan  was  to  make 
the  paper,  then  estimated  as  worth  one  hundred 
thousand  dollars,  with  a  yearly  profit  of  thirty 
thousand  dollars,  a  joint-stock  concern,  divided 
into  one  hundred  shares  of  one  thousand  dollars 
each.  Greeley  and  McElrath  retained  a  majori- 
ty of  the  stock,  while  a  few  shares  were  owned 
by  the  principal  employes — its  assistant  editors 
(mcl^ding  at  that  time  Dana,  Snow,  Ripley, 
and  others),  and  such  other  assistants  as  the 
cashier  and  the  foremen  of  the  press  and  compo- 
sition rooms.  The  stock  immensely  increased 
in  value,  and  changed  hands,  till,  in  a  little  over 
twenty  years,  it  was  estimated  at  one  million 
dollars,  and  its  shares  were  worth  even  as  high 


THE   TRIBUNE.  99 

as  ten  thousand  dollars  ;  one  third  of  the 
shareholders  were  outsiders,  like  Dr.  J.  C. 
Ayer,  of  Lowell.  It  will  be  seen  that  the 
strictly  associational  part  of  the  scheme,  which 
was  Mr.  Greeley's  sole  motive  in  undertaking 
it,  was  a  failure  by  permitting  the  transfer  of 
membership  and  the  division  of  profits  to  those 
not  connected  with  the  actual  producing  of  the 
Tribune,  Still,  as  each  share  was  entitled  to 
one  vote,  the  control  continued  in  the  hands 
of  the  employes,  and  therefore  of  the  editor 
and  the  publisher,  Greeley  and  McElrath.  The 
system  could  not  have  failed  to  elevate  and 
stimulate  all  departments  of  the  work.  Per- 
haps it  would  have  worked  still  better  if,  in 
some  way,  the  far  greater  number  of  subor- 
dinates had  been  made  sharers  in  the  profits. 

One  of  Mr.  Greeley's  enterprises  was  the 
annual  issue  of  an  almanac,  specially  devoted 
to  political  statistics,  and  famously  authorita- 
tive. It  was  begun  with  the  Tribune  in  1 841, 
but  did  not  receive  the  name  of  that  paper  till 
1856,  having  previously  been  called  The  Whig 
Almanac.  Many  features  of  value  and  inter- 
est were  added  to  it  from  time  to  time,  so  that 
it  became,  in  its  way,  **  as  much  of  an  institution 
as  the  Tribune  itself."  Herein,  as  an  almanac- 
maker,  we  find  another  point  of  analogy  be- 
tween Horace  Greeley  and  his  great  forerunner, 
Benjamin  Franklin. 


lOO  HORACE    GREELEY. 

Another  stroke  of  enterprise,  wherein  the 
Tribune  added  a  new  word  to  the  literature  of 
journalism,  was  not  as  successful.  The  troub- 
lous times  of  1848  throughout  all  Europe  gave 
busy  employment  to  the  papers,  and  stirred  up 
a  special  rivalry  in  giving  the  latest  and  the 
fullest  news  of  the  fall  of  dynasties,  the  rise  of 
peoples,  and  the  battles  and  riots  which  were 
of  almost  daily  occurrence.  Ireland,  of  course, 
had  to  have  its  hand  in  such  a  political  and  con- 
tinental "  Ballvcrasther  Fair."  As  Mr.  Gree- 
ley,  always  a  sympathizer  with  that  oppressed 
country,  was  a  leader  in  the  "  Directory  of  the 
Friends  of  Ireland,"  all  looked  for  the  ear- 
liest information  in  its  columns.  Accordingly, 
when  a  great  victory  at  Slievenamon  was  an- 
nounced to  have  occurred  about  August  1st,  it 
obtained  general  credence.  Especially  so, 
when  such  particulars  were  given  as  that  the 
commander  of  the  British  forces  had  been 
killed,  and  six  thousand  troops  killed  and 
wounded  ;  that  the  road  for  three  miles  was 
covered  with  the  dead  ;  that  Kilkenny  and 
Limerick  had  been  taken  by  the  people,  and 
the  people  of  Dublin  had  gone  out  by  thou- 
sands to  assist  ;  that  John  B.  Dillon  was 
wounded  in  both  legs,  and  Thomas  F.  Meagher 
in  both  arms  ;  that  it  was  expected  that  Dublin 
would  rise  and  attack  the  jails  on  the  succeed- 
ing Sunday  night  ;  and  that  the  non-appearance 


THE   TRIBUNE.  lOI 

of  this  intelligence  in  any  Dublin  paper  of  a  true 
account  of  the  battle  was  due  to  intimidation 
by  the  authorities.  But  the  story  turned  out 
to  be  a  fabrication  "  out  of  whole  cloth  ;" 
there  was  no  such  battle,  and  consequently  no 
such  results.  Whether  Mr.  Greeley  himself 
would  have  published  the  hoax,  if  he  had  not 
been  in  the  far  West,  we  cannot  tell.  Suffice  it 
to  say  that  the  faux  pas  is  to  this  day  associat- 
ed with  his  editorial  memory  under  the  name, 
given  it  by  Bennett,  of  "  Slievegammon,"  as 
the  type  of  a  journalistic  ambition  which  "  o'er- 
leaps  itself  and  falls  on  t'other  side." 

A  genuine  as  well  as  a  magnificent  triumph 
was,  however,  scored  by  the  Tribune,  in  which 
it  quite  eclipsed  the  Herald,  in  its  reports  of  the 
Franco-German  War,  especially  in  its  descrip- 
tions of  the  battles  of  Gravelotte  and  Sedan. 

Thus  the  Tribune  continued  to  flourish,  and 
was  able  to  begin  its  fourth  volume  with  an 
enlargement  of  one  third,  and  with  new  type. 
As  the  editor  expressed  it  in  his  announce- 
ment, this  increase  and  prosperity  were  in  spite 
of  the  fact,  which  he  well  knew,  that  many  of 
his  views  were  unacceptable  to  a  large  propor- 
tion of  his  readers, — referring  especially  to  his 
socialism,  advocacy  of  Irish  rights,  and  oppo- 
sition to  capital  punishment.  So  far  as  the 
Whig  Party  was  concerned,  he  acknowledged 
his  obligations,   at   the   same  time  reasserting 


102  HORACE   GREELEY. 

his  paper  to  be  "  not  an  organ,  but  a  humble 
advocate." 

On  February  5th,  1845,  at  four  o'clock  in  the 
morning,  the  Tribime  building  was  burned 
down,  several  of  the  employes  barely  escaping 
with  their  lives,  and  nothing  saved  but  a  few 
books,  not  even  the  forms  on  which  the  press- 
men were  working,  or  a  scrap  of  the  editor's 
papers,  correspondence,  and  manuscripts, — with 
the  important  exception  of  the  mail  books, 
which  were  preserved  in  the  "  salamander 
safe."  A  little  over  half  the  loss  was  covered 
by  insurance.  The  cause  of  the  completeness 
of  the  destruction  was  the  fact  that  a  strong 
gale  was  blowing,  the  streets  were  impassable 
by  a  snow-storm  of  twenty-four  hours'  contin- 
uance, and  the  hydrants  frozen  up.  But  a  tem- 
porary office  was  immediately  hired,  its  friends 
and  its  rivals  united  in  supplying  materials, 
and  the  Tribufie  appeared  the  next  morning 
as  usual.  In  three  months  a  far  more  suitable 
building  had  arisen  on  the  ruins  of  the  old,  and 
in  the  end  the  seeming  set-back  had  proved  a 
step  in  advance.  Mr.  Greeley  wrote  a  highly 
characteristic  editorial  in  that  next  day's  pa- 
per, in  which  he  humorously  and  pathetically 
deplored  his  individual  losses — "  even^he  old 
desk  at  which  we  sat,  the  ponderous  inkstand, 
the  familiar  faces  of  files  of  correspondence,  the 
choice  collection  of  pamphlets,  the  unfinished 


THE   TRIBUNE.  I03 

essay,  the  charts  by  which  we  steered," — yes, 
and  "  those  boots,  and  Webster's  Dictionary.*' 

In  his  agreeable  volume,  Mr.  Parton  gives 
us  an  interior  view  of  the  Tribune  building 
about  1854,  familiar  to  him  as  an  employe. 
At  this  time  Charles  A.  Dana  was  the  manag- 
ing editor,  and  his  associates  such  well-known 
men  as  William  S.  Fry,  George  Ripley,  James 
S.  Pike,  George  M.  Snow,  Bayard  Taylor,  F. 
J.  Ottarson,  Solon  Robinson,  and  three  others. 
Each  of  these  presided  over  a  department, 
such  as  City  Editor,  Marine,  Financial,  Liter- 
ary, Agricultural,  Political,  News  Editor,  For- 
eign and  Domestic,  etc.,  each  with  a  more  or 
less  numerous  staff.  Thus  the  City  Editor  had 
fourteen  assistants,  the  Marine  had  twelve  ; 
tf\e  telegraphic  bureau  had  a  general  agent,  with 
two  subordinates  (at  Liverpool  and  Halifax), 
and  fifty  reporters  in  various  parts  of  the  coun- 
try. There  were  eighteen  foreign  and  twenty 
home,  regular  and  paid,  correspondents.  A 
similar  army  was  found  connected  with  the 
publishing  department.  The  whole  number 
employed  on  the  paper  was  about  two  hundred 
and  twenty,  about  one  hundred  and  thirty 
giving  it  their  whole  time. 

The  hour  is  ten  o'clock  A.M.  We  are  taken 
into  the  editorial  rooms, — first,  into  a  long,  nar- 
row apartment,  with  desks  for  the  principal  edi- 


104  HORACE    GREELEY. 

tors  along  the  sides,  a  file  of  the  Tribune,  shelves 
of  books  and  manuscripts,  and  a  great  heap  of 
exchanges  on  the  floor.  The  desks  are  piled 
with  letters  and  papers,  or  new  publications.  In 
an  inner  room  is  the  chief  editor's  sanctu^n,  with 
a  green  carpet,  two  desks,  a  sofa,  another  file  of 
the  Tribime,  a  large  case  full  of  reference  books, 
and  a  bust  of  Henry  Clay.  Mr.  Greeley's  desk 
looks  out  upon  the  Park,  the  City  Hall,  and 
the  crowds  of  passers  near  and  far. 

One  by  one  the  editors  arrive,  and  are 
graphically  photographed  by  Mr.  Parton  in 
their  turn  ;  and  at  last,  between  twelve  and 
one  o'clock,  Mr.  Greeley  comes  in,  with  his 
pockets  full  of  papers  and  a  bundle  under  his 
arm.  His  first  act  is  to  despatch  his  special 
aide-de-sanct2ini  on  various  errands.  Then 
perhaps  he  will  comment  on  the  morning's  pa- 
per, dwelling  with  pertinacious  emphasis  on  its 
defects.  In  the  sanctum  he  finds  a  heap  of 
letters,  clippings,  and  newspapers,  which  he 
opens  while  several  visitors  state  their  errands 
— usually  some  assistance  or  axe  to  be  ground, 
a  lecture  invitation,  or  an  admirer  who  wants 
to  shake  his  hand.  Thus  the  time  passes  till 
three  or  four  o'clock,  and  then  Mr.  Greeley  is 
ready  to  go  to  dinner.  For  many  years  his 
dining-place  was  one  of  the  best  though  least 
obtrusive  places  in  the  city, — Windust's,  a  few 
doors  from  the  Tribune  office,  whose  sign,  ''Nun- 


THE   TRIBUNE.  I05 

quani  non  paratus,"  will  doubtless  be  recalled  to 
many  of  our  readers'  minds. 

The  scene  then  changes  to  the  editorial 
rooms  at  nine  o'clock  and  after  in  the  evening  : 
"  Seven  desks  are  occupied  with  silent  writers, 
most  of  them  in  the  Tribune  uniform — shirt- 
sleeves and  mustache.  .  .  .  The  editor-in- 
chief  is  at  his  desk,  writing  in  a  singular  atti- 
tude, the  desk  on  a  level  with  his  nose,  and 
the  writer  sitting  bolt  upright.  He  writes 
rapidly,  with  scarcely  a  pause  for  thought,  and 
not  once  in  a  page  makes  an  erasure.  The 
foolscap  leaves  fly  from  under  his  pen  at  the 
rate  of  one  in  fifteen  minutes.  He  does  most 
of  the  thinking  before  he  begins  to  write,  and 
produces  matter  about  as  fast  as  a  swift  copy- 
ist can  copy.  Yet  he  leaves  nothing  for  the 
compositor  to  guess  at,  and  if  he  makes  an  al- 
teration in  the  proof  he  is  careful  to  do  it  in 
such  a  way  that  the  printer  loses  no  time  in 
'  overrunning  ' — that  is,  he  inserts  as  many 
words  as  he  erases.  Not  unfrequently  he 
bounds  up  into  the  composing-room,  and 
makes  a  correction  or  adds  a  sentence  with  his 
own  hand.  He  is  not  patient  under  the  inflic- 
tion of  an  error.  He  expects  men  to  under- 
stand his  wishes  by  intuition  ;  and  when  they 
do  not,  but  interpret  his  half-expressed  orders 
in  a  way  exactly  contrary  to  his  intention,  a 
scene  is  likely  to  occur." 


I06  HORACE    GREELEY. 

When  the  Trihuie  had  completed  its  thirtieth 
year,  April  loth,  1871,  Mr.  Greeley,  only  a  year 
and  a  half  before  his  death,  was  able  to  report 
that  the  small  folio  sheet,  employing  perhaps 
twenty  persons,  was  now  one  of  the  largest 
journals  in  the  world,  containing  ten  to  fifteen 
times  as  much,  and  employing  from  four  to  five 
hundred  persons.  Its  daily  contents,  apart 
from  advertisements,  would  make  a  fair  i2mo 
volume,  such  as  sold  in  the  book-stores  for  one 
dollar  and  a  quarter  to  one  dollar  and  a  half  ; 
and,  when  compelled  to  issue  a  supplement,  its 
reading  contents  equalled  an  average  octavo. 
The  total  cost  of  production  had  grown  from 
five  hundred  and  twenty-five  dollars  to  twenty 
thousand  dollars  a  week.  It  had  always  man- 
aged to  pay  its  own  way  in  the  hardest  times  ; 
and  while  "  rendering  an  earnest  and  zealous, 
though  by  no  means  indiscriminate,  support  to 
the  Whig  and  afterward  to  the  Republican 
Party,  the  Tribune  had  asked  no  favor  of  either, 
and  no  odds  of  any  man  but  that  he  should 
pay  for  what  he  ordered." 

The  latter  sentence  sketches,  perhaps,  the 
most  essential  quality  of  the  Tribiuie  through 
its  entire  existence  under  Horace  Greeley.  It 
was  emphatically  an  independent  journal  of  the 
highest  kind,  as  distinguished  from  the  vain  or 
emasculated  attempt  to  produce  a  neutral  one. 
It  was  such  from  its  very  inception — indepen- 


THE   TRIBUNE.  I07 

dent  of  the  subsidies  either  of  money  or  of 
office.  In  the  above-mentioned  anniversary 
remarks  he  says  :  "  Holding  that  a  journal  can 
help  no  party  while  it  requires  to  be  helped  it- 
self, we  hope  so  to  deserve  and  retain  the 
good-will  of  the  general  public  that  we  may 
be  as  independent  in  the  future  as  we  have 
been  in  the  past."  It  was  established  and  con- 
ducted not  for  money-making,  or  popularity. 
It  was  in  dead  earnest  to  be  indeed  a  "  Tribune 
of  the  People"  in  the  defence  and  promulga- 
tion of  what  it  esteemed  their  rights.  It  rep- 
resented that  genuine  democracy  which  is  too 
true  to  the  people  to  court  their  support  by  the 
least  demagogism  or  the  withholding  of  the 
plainest  w^ords.  It  shared  the  fate  of  all  such 
faithful  and  unselfish  friends,  in  not  being  un- 
derstood or  received  by  its  own,  and  it  seems 
almost  a  miracle  that  its  vigorous  opposition  to 
the  most  popular  currents  of  the  day,  and  its 
unhesitating  championship  or  hospitality  tow- 
ard new  and  unpopular  ideas,  did  not  wreck  it. 
*'  In  a  word,"  says  one  of  its  friends,  "  if  the 
course  of  the  Tribune  had  been  suggested  by  a 
desire  to  give  the  greatest  offence  to  the  great- 
est number,  it  could  hardly  have  made  more 
enemies  than  jt  did."  Its  tone  of  indepen- 
dence is  well  expressed  by  its  editor,  who,  after 
explaining  its  idea  of  a  true  conservatism  as 
opposed  to  a  "  Chinese  tenacity,"  and  the  es- 


I08  HORACE   GREELEY. 

sential  sameness  of  "  the  humble  servitor  and 
bepraiser  of  the  dear  people"  with  "  the  sup- 
ple courtier  and  wholesale  flatterer  of  the  des- 
pot," says  calmly  :  "  Those,  whose  dislike  to 
or  distrust  of  *  the  course  of  the  Tribune  '  impel 
them  to  reject  our  paper,  have  ample  range  for 
a  selection  of  journals  more  acceptable." 

At  the  same  time,  it  must  be  admitted  that 
this  very  quality  of  earnestness  and  indepen- 
dence is  calculated,  in  a  country  like  ours,  to 
commend  it  to  a  large  constituency  who  either 
agree  in  sentiment  or  at  least  in  spirit.  Down- 
right and  transparent  sincerity  have  a  great 
charm  for  multitudes  of  minds,  and  in  a  rapid- 
ly growing  ratio.  Moreover,  the  Tribune  rep-  ♦ 
resented  a  large  majority  of  the  reading  public 
of  America  in  its  advocacy  of  the  protective 
system,  and  was  on  the  crest  of  the  floodtide 
of  the  great  anti-slavery  sentiment.  The  fer- 
vent championship  of  great  ideas  gave  tone 
and  temper  to  its  steel,  and  its  editorial  blade 
was  not  only  sharp  and  cutting,  but  struck  out 
continual  sparks.  One  may  soon  grow  tired 
of  mere  smartness  or  entertainment,  but  not  of 
the  blood-earnestness  and  incisive  swordsman- 
ship of  the  true  fighter, — especially  if  he  be  the 
knightly  champion  of  the  wronged  and  weak. 

Another  point  in  favor  of  the  Tribune,  and 
a  secret  of  its  success,  was  mentioned  in  Parlia- 
ment by  the  late  John  Bright.      After  speaking 


THE    TRIBUNE  109 

in  praise  of  its  general  excellence  and  ability, 
"  venturing  to  say  that  there  was  not  a  better 
paper  than  this  in  London,"  he  pronounced  as 
one  of  its  chief  merits  that  "  he  found  not  in 
it  a  syllable  that  he  might  not  put  on  his  table 
and  allow  his  wife  and  daughter  to  read  with 
satisfaction."  It  is  to  be  regretted  that  our 
best  papers,  and  even  the  Tribune  at  times, 
have  not  always  upheld  this  high  standard. 

A  comprehensive  estimate  of  the  Tribune' s 
place  in  journalism  is  given  in  Mr.  George 
Ripley's  address  at  the  laying  of  the  corner- 
stone of  the  third  (and  present)  building,  after 
the  second  one  had  been  burned  down  in  1873. 
The  foundation  was  originally  laid  in  ideas  and 
sentiments.  Horace  Greeley  was  a  man  of 
profound  convictions  and  emotional  tender- 
ness, as  well  as  of  lofty  aspirations.  His  paper 
was  consecrated  to  the  promulgation  of  truth. 
It  represented  the  scientific  movement  which 
began  with  the  deaths  of  Hegel  and  Goethe, 
two  or  three  years  before  the  Tribune  was 
founded,  and,  at  the  same  time,  the  new  reac- 
tion which  was"  setting  in,  that  refused  to  re- 
gard the  results  of  physical  research  as  the 
limit  of  rational  belief.  Thus  it  had  through- 
out represented  the  intellectual  spirit  of  the 
age  ;  it  had  welcomed  every  new  discovery  of 
truth  ;  and,  free  from  the  limitations  of  party 
in  politics,   science,  philosophy,  or  religion,  it 


I  lO  HORACE   GREELEV. 

had  watched  with  its  hundred  eyes,  ahke  the 
events  of  the  passing  time  and  the  harbingers 
of  a  brighter  day. 

We  need  only  add  that  till  his  death  the 
Tribime  and  Horace  Greeley  were  one  and  in- 
separable ;  the  paper  was  the  mirror,  the  em- 
bodiment of  and  the  clew  to  the  man.  It  was 
also  his  idol,  every  line  of  it  as  precious  as  is  his 
growing  marble  in  the  sculptor's  eye.  He  read 
it  carefully,  says  one  of  his  co-laborers,  column 
by  column  and  article  by  article,  every  day  from 
its  first  number  until  the  week  of  his  death  ;  if 
he  missed  any  numbers  in  his  travels  he  was 
sure  to  hunt  them  up  on  his  return  ;  and  he  so 
absorbed  their  contents  that  he  remembered 
years  after  where  to  find  anything  that  had 
attracted  his  attention. 

Other  matters  relating  to  the  Tribune  will  be 
found  under  various  heads,  such  as  "  The 
Editor,"  "  The  Social  Reformer,"  -'  The  Politi- 
cian," '*  The  Civil  War,"  and  "Friends  and 
Co-laborers,  * '  to  which  we  refer  our  readers.  It 
is  impossible,  as  we  have  said,  to  make  any 
clean  distinction  between  the  man  and  the 
many  currents  which  he  made  for  his  energies, 
or  colored  with  his  vitality. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

THE  EDITOR. 

Whether  there  be  such  a  thing  as  a  "  born 
editor"  or  not,  it  is  certain  that  Horace  Gree- 
ley took  to  this  business  as  early  and  as  eas'ily 
as  a  duckling  does  to  its  '  *  native  element. ' '  As 
he  eagerly  seized  and  read  the  local  paper  of  his 
boyhood,  there  seems  to  have  come  over  him 
somewhat  of  Correggio's  feeling  when  he  saw 
Raphael's  picture,  "  I,  too,  am  a  painter  !" 
for  even  at  that  early  day  he  declared  his  de- 
termination to  be  a  printer,  evidently  regard- 
ing the  latter  as  the  man  who  made  the  paper 
in  its  entirety,  or,  at  least,  the  printer's  case  as 
the  trap-door  to  the  editor's  office.  We  have 
shown,  too,  how  he  took  every  opportunity  in 
his  apprentice  days  to  make  editorial  contribu- 
tions, in  the  way  of  news  items  and  brief  com- 
ments. It  does  not  appear  that  he  ever  had 
any  other  occupation  in  view,  even  when  chop- 
ping wood  and  ploughing  the  rocky  soil  of  the 
White  and  Green  Mountain  States.  The  fail- 
ure of  his  father  at  first  to  negotiate  satisfac- 
torily with  the  publisher  of  the  Poultney 
Spectator y  and  the  words,  *'  Come,  my  boy,  let. 


112  HORACE    GREELEY. 

US  go  home,"  were  like  the  closing  of  the  gate 
of  Paradise  in  the  Peri's  face. 

He  was  essentially,  if  not  exclusively,  a 
publicist.  Private  and  personal  matters  had 
no  interest  for  him,  as  compared  with  public 
affairs,  the  politics  of  his  country,  the  great 
movements  of  the  nations,  and  the  questions 
of  reform  which  related  to  social  progress.  He 
wanted  to  be  and  rejoiced  in  being  an  editor, 
that  he  might  bring  to  bear  a  great  engine  of 
information  and  propulsion  upon  these  world- 
wide and  human  interests.  In  this  endeavor,  it 
has  been  well  said,  "  he  put  away  from  him  all 
thirst  for  renown,  all  appetite  for  wealth,  all 
desire  for  personal  advantage.  He  never 
counted  the  cost  of  his  words  ;  he  never  in- 
quired what  course  would  pay,  or  what  would 
please  his  subscribers.  He  held  in  magnificent 
disdain  the  meaner  sort  of  editor  .  .  .  who 
strives  only  to  print  what  will  sell,"  and  held 
him  "  as  bad  as  the  parson  who  preaches  only 
to  fill  the  pews." 

He  was  the  editor  in  all  he  did,^that  is,  the 
diffuser  of  intelligence  and  educator  of  the 
people.  A  correspondent  who  represented 
himself  as  having  gained  a  fortune  and  having 
no  children  to  provide  for,  once  asked  for  ad- 
vice as  to  the  best  use  to  make  of  his  money. 
Mr.  Greeley's  first  suggestion  was  to  establish 
in  New  York  "  a  Universal  Free  Intelligence 


THE   EDITOR.  II3 

Office,"  as  a  vast  medium  of  communication 
between  labor  and  employment.  His  lectures 
and  books  are  simply  enlarged  and  elaborated, 
or  collated,  editorials  on  the  only  class  of  topics 
on  which  he  cared  to  write, — never  for  enter- 
tainment, but  always  to  make  men  think  or 
arouse  them  to  practical  action.  He  was,  what 
he  called  his  paper,  the  "  Tribune  of  the  Peo- 
ple." He  lost  much  tiine  by  his  accessibility  to 
their  visits  in  office-hours,  and  much  of  his  over- 
work came  from  replying  to  their  countless  in- 
quiries with  his  own  hand.  (He  never  could,  or 
would,  write  by  dictation.)  He  cared  nothing 
for  "the  guinea  stamp,  * '  and  valued  men  as  the 
factors  of  a  great  humanity.  That  this  human- 
ity might  be  free,  might  be  intellectually  and 
morally  educated,  and  might  be  led  to  higher 
reaches  in  social  organization,  was  the  end  al- 
ways in  view.  He  was  a  "  fighting  editor," 
because  he  had  espoused  the  cause  of  mankind. 
He  was  a  true  knight-errant,  because  his  lance 
was  always  at  the  service  of  the  weak,  the 
down-trodden,  the  wronged.  We  may  antici- 
pate our  final  summing  up  of  his  career  and 
character  by  pointing  to  this  unquestioned  and 
unique  position  which  he  holds  among  the  great 
and  successful  editors  of  the  world,  as  a  more 
lofty  and  majestic  pedestal  than  any  other  secu- 
lar place  among  world-movers  and  "  worthies." 
We  emphasize  the  word  editor^  for  Horace 


114  HORACE    GREELEY. 

Greeley  was  pitiably  unsuccessful  till  he  could 
gather  the  reins  in  his  own  hands.  His  inten- 
sity and  singleness  of  aim,  as  well  as.  his  im- 
periousness  of  disposition,  unfitted  him  to  be 
a  subordinate.  He  stepped  into  his  office  like 
an  admiral  on  the  deck  of  his  flag-ship.  He 
watched  every  spar  and  rope  and  speck  upon 
the  planks  with  a  lynx  eye,  and  his  whole  com- 
fort for  the  day  was  wrecked  if  his  inspection 
was  not  perfectly  satisfied.  His  letters  writ- 
ten to  Mr.  Dana,  his  managing  editor,  during 
the  time  he  himself  was  in  Washington,  watch- 
ing the  fateful  political  struggles  of  1855-56 
over  the  election  of  Banks  to  the  Speakership, 
and  the  Kansas-Nebraska  Question,  as  Tribune 
correspondent,  strikingly  illustrate  his  extreme 
sensitiveness  to  the  omissions,  or  what  he  con- 
sidered the  "  stupid"  or  disobedient  commis- 
sions of  his  subordinates.  "  Friend  Dana" 
must  h?ive  found  life  a  "  torture,"  if  not  a 
"heart-break,"  to  him  from  these  constant 
broadsides,  quite  as  much  as  he  who  fired  them 
with  the  subscription,  "  Yours  sadly"  or 
''Yours  soreheadedly. "  His  realization  of 
the  fact  that  he  was  no  more  to  be  the  autocrat 
of  the  Tribune  on  his  resumption  of  the  editor- 
ship after  the  Presidential  election  of  1872, 
should  not  be  overlooked  among  the  causes 
under  which  this  overworked  and  disappointed 
man  sank  so  suddenly  into  his  grave. 


THE   EDITOR.  II5 

He  was  a  fearfully  overtasked  man,  with- 
out realizing  it,  alike  from  his  splendid  consti- 
tution and  temperate  habits,  and  from  his  de- 
light in  work  for  its  own  sake  ;  as  Mr.  Ripley 
says,  "  In  respect  to  work  he  was  positively 
fanatical."  He  was  never  idle,  and  he  did  not 
know  how  to  rest  or  take  recreation  ;  his  idea 
of  a  vacation  was  to  go  on  a  lecturing  tour. 
His  average  day's  work  is  stated  to  have  been 
from  two  to  three  columns  of  the  Tribune,  be- 
sides a  dozen  letters,  and  a  large  amount  of 
other  work  which  devolves  upon  an  editor.  In 
the  Presidential  campaign  of  1844,  he  averaged 
four  columns  a  day  and  answered  twenty  let- 
ters, besides  travelling  all  over  the  country, 
addressing  meetings  almost  every  day,  and  be- 
ing in  constant  conference  with  local  politicians. 
The  result  of  this  tremendous  exertion  was  to 
so  deplete  his  system  that  he  broke  out  into 
boils  on  his  right  arm,  at  the  rate  of  twenty  at 
one  time  between  his  wrist  and  elbow.  When 
in  the  city  he  worked  sixteen  hours,  and  so  late 
that  he  had  to  walk  the  long  distance  home  on 
foot.  He  was  known  to  have  remained  in  his 
office  chair  witliout  ceasing  from  eleven  in  the 
morning  till  nearly  midnight.  His  books,  ad- 
dresses, and  periodical  articles  were  crowded 
into  his  editorial  work.  It  is  no  exaggeration 
to  say  that  "  probably  no  other  person  of  his 
age  in  the  Union  accomplished  as  much  work 


I  1 6  HORACE   GREELEY. 

as  he  did  on  an  average."  And  yet  he  had  his 
premonitions  and  hints  of  his  physical  limita- 
tions, for  we  find  him  signing  a  letter  to  Thur- 
lovv  Weed,  in  1837,  written  at  "  half-past  twelve 
o'clock"  at  night,  ''yours  tiredy  sleepy ^  attd 
with  a  headache. 

Mr.  Greeley's  special  forte,  though  he  kept 
such  a  close  watch  on  all  departments  of  his 
journal  and  was  apt  to  have  his  finger  in  every 
section  of  the  pie,  was  undoubtedly  in  the 
waiting  of  editorials  and  in  the  vigor  and  vig- 
ilance of  its  political  department,  especially  in 
the  fulness  and  accuracy  of  its  political  intel- 
ligence. Dr.  Leonard  Bacon  used  to  say  of  a 
Connecticut  minister,  famous  for  his  relish  and 
capacity  for  ecclesiastical  **  minutes"  and  fig- 
ures, "  I  do  believe  that  man  has  a  statistical 
devil  !"  Mr.  Greeley's  political  statistics  were 
such  a  boon  and  reliance  to  all  who  were  inter- 
ested in  elections  that  he  would  be  a  sorry  in- 
grate  who  should  say,  "  He  hath  a  devil."  He 
himself  had  little  need  of  almanacs  or  printed 
records  ;  even  as  far  back  as  his  Poultney  days 
he  was  the  referee  and  oracle  on  all  such  points. 
"  His  memory,"  says  Mr.  Ripley,  "  was  as  re- 
tentive as  Pascal's.  His  mind  was  a  marvellous 
storehouse  of  facts,  dates,  and  events.  He 
seemed  to  forget  nothing  worth  remembering. 
He  was  a  political  cyclopaedia  of  the  best  revised 
edition.      He  was  every  hour  of  the  day  what 


THE    EDITOR,  11/ 

the  Tribune  Ahnajtac  was  at  the  close  of  De- 
cember." 

How  far  his  poh'tlcs  and  "  notions"  affected 
the  "  success"  of  his  great  journal,  it  were  hard 
to  say  ;  they  may  have  helped  as  much  as 
they  retarded  it.  One  critic  says,  "  Mr.  Gree- 
ley would  be  the  greatest  journalist  of  the 
world  if  he  did  not  aim  to  be  one  of  the  lead- 
ing politicians  in  America."  Another  says, 
*'  If  Mr.  Greeley  would  devote  himself  to  the 
Tribune  alone,  and  ignore  politics  and  farm- 
ing, he  would  be  one  of  the  greatest  journal- 
ists."  And  it  has  been  one  of  the  commonest 
remarks  that  the  freedom  of  discussion  on  new 
and  unpopular  reforms  was  a  great  drawback 
to  the  Tribune  in  its  early  days.  But  novelty, 
when  well  managed,  has  the  effect  of  a  contin- 
uous sensation,  and  "  live  issues"  make  a  living 
and  magnetic  paper.  Horace  Greeley  had  a 
genuine  editorial  instinct, — that  is  to  say,  the 
ability  of  projecting  himself  into  the  minds  of 
his  readers  and  instinctively  to  judge  what 
would  interest  them.  The  greater  part  of  the 
budget  of  letters  to  his  managing  editor,  re- 
cently published  in  the  Sun^  is  taken  up  with 
pointing  out  and  protesting  against  mistakes 
in  this  respect.  And  yet  it  is  this  very  man- 
aging editor,  who,  among  Mr.  Greeley's  "  re- 
markable qualifications  for  the  profession," 
enumerates  **  a  quick  perception  of  the  signifi- 


IlS  HORACE    GREELEY. 

cance  of  events,  an  accurate  judgment  of  the 
mutual  relations  of  occurrences,  a  ready  ap- 
preciation of  the  drift  of  popular  currents,  and 
a  sympathetic  comprehension  of  the  public 
temper  of  the  hour."  His  literary  judgment, 
also,  was  excellent  in  the  selections  which  he 
made,  especially  in  the  New  Yorker,  and  in  his 
apparently  unvaried  and  unqualified  approval  of 
Mr.  Ripley's  management  of  the  literary  de- 
partment of  the  Trihme,  However  conscious 
of  his  own  disqualifications  or  limitations  in 
many  of  the  departments,  he  had  the  instinct 
to  bring  about  him  the  most  brilliant  galaxy  of 
journalists  we  have  had  in  New  York, — many 
of  whom  he  himself  had  discovered  and  devel- 
oped. Concerning  some  of  these  and  their  re- 
lations with  Mr.  Greeley,  we  shall  have  occa- 
sion to  speak  again. 

His  own  style  was  distinguished  by  its  sim- 
plicity and  conciseness,  and  by  the  purity  of 
his  English,  so  that  he  has  been  called  the 
American  Cobbett.  But  what  is  most  charac- 
teristic  is  its  directness,  its  unhalting  and  un- 
swerving progress  from  the  first  sentence  to 
the  equally  abrupt  yet  complete  close.  If  not 
"  half-battles,"  like  Luther's,  they  were  suc- 
cessive cannonades,  which  came  with  cumula- 
tive force.  He  thoroughly  appreciated  the 
power  of  varied  repetition  upon  public  opinion. 
Although  he  always  meant   to  do  away  with 


THE   EDITOR,  II9 

titles  to  editorials,  and  never  did,  he  had  a  posi- 
tive genius  for  headings,  at  once  awakening 
attention  and  yet  not  unduly  anticipating  the 
subjoined  article.  And  yet  his  style  was  a  tidal 
one,  rising  at  times  into  flaming  language,  into 
outbursts  of  denunciation,  into  flashes  of  wit 
and  irony,  and  again  disclosing  an  unexpected 
tenderness  and  sentiment.  It  was  never  com- 
monplace nor  devoid  of  homely  and  ingenious 
illustration.  He  was  sometimes  extravagant 
and  even  vituperative  in  his  expressions,  though 
remarkably  self-restrained  and  conservative  in 
comparison  with  his  letters  or  his  conversation. 
He  was  as  fair  as  he  was  forceful  in  argument, 
being  careful  (a  rare  thing  in  those  days)  to 
quote,  as  far  as  possible,  the  exact  language  of 
his  opponent. 

The  whole  truth,  however,  will  not  allow  us 
to  pass  by  the  less  amiable  traits  of  Mr.  Gree- 
ley's editorial  character.  Whether  entirely 
from  natural  temperament,  or  from  a  life-long 
overstrain  of  his  nervous  system,  he  was  the 
creature  of  his  own  moods,  and  was  constantly 
driven  by  them  into  personalities  and  abuse. 
He  was  no  respecter  of  persons  in  this  regard, 
and  would  apply  to  men  like  William  C.  Bry- 
ant and  John  Bigelow  his  favorite  language, 
"You  lie,  you  villain,  you  know  you  lie,"  as 
readily  as  to  the  lowest  member  of  the  Sunday 
press.     In  reply  to  Major  M.  M.  Noah's  charge 


I20  HORACE    GREELEY. 

that  Greeley  had  breakfasted  with  two  colored 
men  at  a  boarding-house,  he  did  not  content 
himself  with  a  denial  of  the  fact,  and  an  asser- 
tion  that  he  should  not  regard  it  as  a  thing  to 
be  ashamed  of  if  he  had,  but  he  took  occasion 
to  remind  his  opponent  that  for  eighteen  cen- 
turies his  kindred  had  been  "  accursed  of  God, 
outlawed  and  outcast,  and  unfit  to  be  the  as- 
sociates of  Christians,  Mussulmans,  or  even  self- 
respecting  heathen  ;"  and  that  "  where  there 
are  thousands  who  would  not  eat  with  a  negro, 
there  are  (or  lately  were)  tens  of  thousands  who 
would  not  eat  with  a  Jew."  He  himself  dis- 
claimed any  such  prejudice,  and  asserted  that 
he  treated  all  men  according  to  what  they  were 
and  not  whence  they  sprang.  He  left  to  such 
"  renegades"  as  Noah  the  stirring  up  of  preju- 
dices. "  That  he  is  a  knave,  we  think  much 
to  his  discredit  ;  that  he  is  a  Jew,  nothing, 
however  unfortunate  it  may  be  for  that  luck- 
less people."  The  worst  thing  about  this  kind 
of  writing  was  his  inconsistency,  by  which  he 
would  pass  over  in  silence  or  treat  with  patience 
the  serious  attacks  from  respectable  sources, 
concerning,  perhaps,  the  most  important  prin- 
ciples of  his  belief  and  policy,  and  then  reply 
in  a  fury  of  personalities  to  the  most  trifling  hit 
of  a  paper  which  should  have  been  beneath  his 
notice.  It  was  simply  the  outburst  of  ill-temper. 
It  was  this  same  constitutional  sensitiveness, 


THE    EDITOR,  121 

which  made  him  a  hard  master.  He  did  not 
mean  to  be  unkind  to  his  assistants,  but  the 
evidence  is  too  general  to  shut  our  eyes  to  the 
fact  that,  while  he  gave  them  credit  for  work 
which  satisfied  him,  he  was  extremely  impa- 
tient with  their  mistakes,  and  even  with  their 
imperfectness  according  to  his  standards.  It 
seemed  impossible  for  him  to  understand  that 
others  should  not  take  the  same  interest  in 
certain  subjects  as  he,  or  that  they  should  not 
have  all  data  and  figures  connected  therewith 
at  their  fingers'  ends,  like  himself.  A  very 
slight  omission  of  news  led  to  the  absurd  ex- 
clamation :  "You  crucify  me,  yes,  you  will 
crucify  me  with  such  management  !"  At  an- 
other time  he  wrote  to  his  managing  editor 
from  Washington  :  "  For  God's  sake  speak 
the  truth  to  me.  ...  I  must  give  it  up  and 
go  home.  You  are  getting  everybody  to  curse 
me.  I  am  too  sick  to  be  out  of  bed,  too  crazy 
to  sleep,  and  am  surrounded  by  horrors.  I 
can  just  bear  the  responsibilities  that  belong  to 
me,  but  you  heap  a  load  on  me  that  will  kill 
me."  In  succeeding  letters  he  says  humbly  : 
**  You  must  not  get  cross  with  me.  You  see,  it 
seems  hard  to  stay  in  this  dreary,  infernal  hole 
to  write  letters,  which  mere  delay  makes  a  great 
deal  more  stupid  even  than  they  naturally  are  ;" 
and  again  :  "  Let  me  thank  you  for  your  glori- 
ous issue  of  yesterday,  including  supplement." 


122  HORACE   GREELEY. 

It  was  a  frequent  custom,  when  answering 
attacks,  to  write  over  his  own  initials,  though 
there  appeared  no  good  reason  for  it.  It  was 
doubtless  one  of  the  effects  of  that  personal 
journalism  which  was  at  its  height  in  his  day, 
but  has  passed  away  with  him  who  was  its 
most  striking  exemplar. 

Ev^ery  one  has  heard  of  Horace  Greeley's 
extraordinary  handwriting,  which  required 
special  and  expert  printers  to  set  it  up.  It 
gives  the  impression  not  of  carelessness,  but  of 
a  want  of  control  over  the  muscles  of  his  hand. 
Some  words  are  like  the  painfully  and  im- 
perfectly formed  work  of  aged  or  partially 
paralyzed  or  cramped  fingers.  There  is  a  lack 
of  consistency  throughout,  some  words  being 
quite  distinct,  and  others  illegible,  without 
form,  and  void.  The  letter  a,  as  distinct  from 
0,  is  a  non-existence  ;  b  and  /  and  h  are  apt 
to  be  indistinguishable.  The  present  writer, 
when  a  youth,  happened  to  be  seated  at  a  ta- 
ble in  the  Union  League  Club,  one  evening,  at 
which  Horace  Greeley  was  writing  an  editorial. 
As  foolscap  page  after  page  was  dashed  off, 
they  fell  directly  under  my  eye,  and  I  took  the 
liberty  of  studying  the  chirography,  a  great 
sprawl  and  scrawl  of  hieroglyphics,  till  my 
heart  ached  for  the  poor  printer  who  should 
have  to  set  it  up  under  the  gaslight  before 
morning.     A    funny    story    is  told   of  a  reply 


THE   EDITOR.  1 23 

which  he  made  to  a  Western  lecture  commit- 
tee, declining  their  invitation  on  the  ground 
that  he  would  be  "  sixty  years  old  on  next 
February  3d.**  The  reply  came,  that  his  pen- 
manship had  taken  them  some  time  to  trans- 
late ;  but  they  had  succeeded,  and  the  time, 
**  February  3d,"  and  terms,  "  sixty  dollars,*' 
were  entirely  satisfactory.  They  also  mistook 
his  statement  that  he  "  must  decline  to  lecture 
henceforth,  except  in  this  immediate  vicinity, 
if  at  all*', — answering,  "  As  you  suggest,  we 
may  be  able  to  get  you  other  engagements  in 
this  immediate  vicinity.  *  *  Another  illustration 
is  told  of  his  writing  a  letter  to  an  employe, 
discharging  him  for  gross  neglect  of  duty.  Af- 
ter a  number  of  years  of  absence  in  California, 
the  man  returned,  and,  meeting  Mr.  Greeley, 
was  asked  by  him  how  he  had  gotten  along. 
"  Let  me  see,*'  he  continued,  **  didn't  I  get 
mad  at  you  and  send  you  off?"  "  Oh,  yes, 
you  wrote  me  a  letter,  telling  me  to  clear  out. 
Taking  the  letter  with  me,  I  found  that  no- 
body could  read  it  ;  so  I  gave  it  my  own  in- 
terpretation as  a  letter  of  recommendation,  and 
got  several  first-rate  situations  by  it,  and  I  am 
really  very  much  obliged  to  you." 

Mr.  Greeley's  own  views  of  journalism  are 
freely  and  frequently  given.  It  was  to  him 
not  so  much  a  profession  as  a  passion.      This 


124  HORACE   GREELEY. 

extended  to  the  minutest  details  of  the  business 
,of  making  a  paper,  from  the  first  and  most 
mechanical  stage  to  its  completed  issue.  Each 
day's  number  was  like  a  new  canvas,  to  be 
transformed  with  its  own  significance  and  color. 
He  believed  that  education  for  the  editorship 
should  begin  at  the  bottom,  and  should  be  as 
natural  a  promotion  as  from  the  forecastle  to 
the  cabin  ;  that  the  milk  for  journalistical  babes 
was  printer's-ink.  Like  the  old  regime  of 
editors — the  Bennetts,  the  Ritchies,  and  the 
Weeds — he  neither  had,  nor  did  he  believe  in, 
a  liberal  education  as  a  preliminary  to  the  edi- 
torial profession.  "  Of  all  horned  cattle,  a 
college  graduate  in  a  newspaper  office  is  the 
worst,**  was  his  characteristic  way  of  putting 
it  ;  nowadays,  we  doubt  whether  many  others 
are  or  could  be  in  the  highest  positions.  The 
limitations  of  extreme  cheapness  he  held  to  be 
incompatible  to  produce  more  than  a  mere 
news-letter,  as  distinct  from  a  newspaper, — the 
mere  germ  of  his  comprehensive  definition  of 
the  latter,  viz.,  to  **  embody  in  a  single  sheet 
the  information  daily  required  by  all  those  who 
aim  to  keep  posted  on  every  important  occur- 
rence, so  that  the  lawyer,  the  merchant,  the 
banker,  the  forwarder,  the  economist,  the  au- 
thor, the  politician,  etc.,  may  find  here  what- 
ever he  needs  to  see,  and  be  spared  the  trouble 
to  look  elsewhere." 


THE   EDITOR.  I25 

In  a  letter  of  advice  to  a  country  editor, 
written  in  i860,  he  extends  with  considerable 
minuteness  this  essential  principle  to  local  and 
rural  papers.  Some  of  the  points  of  this  kind 
and  practical  epistle  should  be  given  for  their 
autobiographic  significance.  He  bids  his  friend 
to  begin  with  the  clear  idea  that,  next  to  him- 
self, the  average  human  being  is  most  con- 
cerned about  his  nearest  neighbors, — a  thing  of 
which  it  seemed  to  him  country  editors  were 
oblivious.  Therefore  he  should  have  a  local 
correspondent,  wide-awake  and  judicious,  in 
every  township  and  village  of  his  county  (in- 
dicating the  kind  of  person  and  employment 
likely  to  serve  the  purpose  best),  who  should 
promptly  send  every  item  which  occurred  in 
the  churches,  the  business  of  all  kinds,  the  real- 
estate  transactions,  or  anything  which  was  of 
interest  to  a  dozen  families, — every  birth,  mar- 
riage, and  death,  every  house-raising,  every 
big  tree  cut,  or  big  beet  grown,  or  big  crop 
harvested, — statistical  and  historical  accounts 
of  each  township.  * '  In  short,  make  your  paper 
a  perfect  mirror  of  everything  done  in  the 
county  which  its  citizens  ought  to  know  ;  .  .  . 
make  up  half  your  journal  of  local  matter  thus 
collected,  and  nobody  in  the  county  can  long 
do  without  it."  Next,  his  neophyte  is  to 
"  take  an  earnest,  if  not  a  leading,  part  in  the 
advancement  of  home    industry,"   promoting 


126  HORACE    GREELEY. 

fairs  in  the  townships,  and  the  starting  of  new 
business  enterprises,  whereby  he  would  in 
time  largely  increase  the  population  of  the 
county  and  the  value  of  every  acre  of  its  soil. 
Finally,  "  don' t  let  the  politicians  and  aspirants 
of  the  town  own  you."  If  he  saw  what  they  did 
not,  "  speak  out ;  do  your  best"  to  keep  down 
offices  and  expenses,  and  the  consequent  rate 
of  taxation,  except  for  common  schools,  as  low 
as  may  be,  remembering,  "  in  addition  to  the 
radical  righteousness  of  the  thing,  that  the 
tax-payers  take  more  papers  than  the  consum- 
ers. 

From  one  of  his  lectures  we  take  a  few  sen- 
tences to  show  the  views  which  Mr.  Greeley 
took  of  his  own  profession,  its  difficulties,  and 
its  high  calling.  From  the  circumstances  of 
the  case,  the  editor  cannot  speak  deliberately  ; 
*'  he  must  write  of  to-day's  incidents  and  aspects, 
though  these  may  be  overlaid  and  transformed 
by  the  incidents  and  aspects  of  to-morrow. 
He  must  write  and  strive  in  the  full  con- 
sciousness that  whatever  honor  and  distinction 
he  may  acquire  must  perish  with  the  generation 
that  bestowed  them.  .  .  .  No  other  public 
teacher  lives  so  wholly  in  the  present  as  the 
editor  ;  and  the  noblest  affirmations  of  un- 
popular truth  .  .  .  can  but  be  noted  in  their 
day,  and  with  their  day  forgotten."  .  .  . 
The  true  editor  must  have  "  a  different  and  a 


THE   EDITOR.  12/ 

sterner  path"  than  the  "dexterous  sidler," 
the  non-achievements  of  whose  hfe  are  em- 
blazoned on  the  whitest  marble,  and  who 
is  "  blessed  by  archbishops  or  followed  by  the 
approving  shouts  of  ascendant  majorities." 
He  must  find  his  "  recompense  for  their  loss 
in  the  calm  verdict  of  an  approving  conscience  ; 
and  the  tears  of  the  despised  and  the  friend- 
less, preserved  from  utter  despair  by  his  efforts 
and  remonstrances,  may  freshen  for  a  season 
the  daisies  that  bloom  above  his  grave. " 

In  1 85 1  Mr.  Greeley  appeared  before  a 
Committee  of  Parliament,  composed  of  men 
like  Richard  Cobden  and  Sir  Milner  Gibson, 
on  the  repeal  of  the  newspaper  stamp-tax.  Of 
the  valuable  and  ready  information  which  he 
then  gave  of  the  American  press,  we  should  be 
remiss  in  not  giving  some  items.  There  were 
fifteen  dailies  published  in  New  York,  ten  in 
the  morning  and  five  in  the  evening,  not  in- 
cluding evening  editions  of  morning  papers  ; 
their  aggregate  circulation  was  about  one  hun- 
dred and  thirty  thousand  a  day.  The  Tribune 
printing-press  would  workofT  only  len  thousand 
an  hour  ;  the  Sun,  he  believed,  could  work  off 
eighteen  thousand.  The  latter  paper  was  con- 
sidered worth  a  quarter  of  a  million  dollars  ; 
but  its  value,  on  account  of  its  cheapness,  was 
almost  entirely  in  its  advertisements.  The  en- 
tire number  of  distinct  journals  published   in 


1 28  HORACE   GREELEY. 

the  United  States  was  twenty-five  hundred,  of 
which  about  two  thousand  were  devoted  to 
news  and  politics,  and  the  others  to  science, 
education,  and  religion.  About  two  hundred 
and  fifty  of  these  were  dailies,  issuing  an  aggre- 
gate of  a  million  or  more  papers  a  day.  He 
thought  three  fourths  of  all  the  families  of  New 
York  took  in  a  daily  paper  of  some  sort,  even 
(to  the  surprise  of  the  Englishmen)  nearly  every 
mechanic,  who  maybe  found  reading  his  news- 
paper after  breakfast  or  dinner,  "  just  as  the 
upper  classes  of  England  do."  The  working 
people  did  not  go  to  public-houses  to  read  the 
paper  ;  it  is  not  the  attraction  there,  and  a  very 
small  proportion  of  the  reading  class  go  there 
at  all.  A  newspaper  was  generally  definable  as 
"  something  printed  as  often  as  once  a  week," 
and  the  others  as  magazines  and  periodicals. 
The  highest  salary  that  he  knew  of  was  three 
thousand  dollars  ;  the  highest  thinkable  was 
five  thousand  dollars.  The  usual  range,  as  in 
the  Tribune,  besides  the  principal  editor,  was 
fifteen  hundred  dollars  down  to  five  hundred 
dollars.  He  considered  the  newspaper  reading 
worth  all  the  schools  in  the  country.  It  cre- 
ates a  taste  for  reading  in  the  child,  and  in- 
creases his  interest  in  his  lessons.  He  thought 
the  press  had  more  and  wider  influence  in  the 
United  States  than  in  England  ;  more  weight 
was  laid  upon  the  intelligence  than  the  editori- 


THE   EDITOR.  1 29 

als,  and  the  paper  which  brought  the  quickest 
news  was  the  one  looked  to.  The  telegraphic 
despatch,  and  not  the  "leading  article,"  was 
the  great  point.  Not  a  hundredth  part  of  the 
use  was  made  of  the  telegraph  in  news-send- 
ing in  England  as  in  America  ;  about  one  hun- 
dred thousand  dollars  a  year  was  paid  by  the 
six  associated  papers,  besides  what  each  got 
separately  for  itself. 

Horace  Greeley,  as  we  have  intimated,  rep- 
resented an  era  in  journalism — the  transition 
from  the  old,  heavy,  costly,  and  party-owned 
paper  of  the  previous  generations  of  the  Blairs, 
the  RItchies,  the  Croswells,  and  the  Webbs. 
Nothing  has  distinguished  that  epoch  more  than 
personal  journalism — a  journalism  chiefly  known 
by  the  individuality  of  its  editorials,  and  that  in- 
dividuality a  marked  and  even  eccentric  one  ; 
the  paper  having  a  centaur-like  relation  to  the 
editor — a  personal  organ,  rather  than  an  insti- 
tution by  itself.  But  with  Mr.  Greeley  the 
last  of  that  masterful  regime  has  passed  away, 
not  because  as  great  and  individual  men  have 
not  arisen,  but  because  the  swelling  flood  of 
world-intelligence  and  world-discussion  no 
longer  permits  the  little  Canutes  to  sit  and 
wave  their  sceptres  on  its  shore. 

It  is  interesting  to  note  that  the  journalistic 
careers  of  Greeley  and  Bennett  began  and  end- 


I30  HORACE   GREELEY. 

ed  at  the  same  time.     They  both  died  in  1872  ; 
and  when  the  job  printers,  Greeley  &  Co.,  were 
cogitating  the  New  Yorker   in    1834,  a  young 
man,  already  known  as  a  clever  writer  for  the 
press,   stepped   in   one   day   and,   exhibiting  a 
modest  roll  of  bills,  invited  Horace  Greeley  to 
join  in  starting  a  new  cheap  daily,  to  be  called 
the  New  York  Herald.     The  overture  was  de- 
clined, but  the  applicant  was  recommended  to 
some  other  printer,  who  proved  more  willing. 
The  young  man  was  James  Gordon   Bennett, 
and  the  Herald  soon  appeared  under  his  name, 
and  that  of  the  printer — who  might  have  been 
Horace  Greeley  !     And  if  so,  what  then  ?     A 
newspaper  critic  considers  Mr.  Bennett  at  the 
head  of  those  who  "  seek  to  float  on   the  cur- 
rent, instead  of  directing  its  course,"  and   Mr. 
Greeley  as  "  first  among  those  who  have  made 
newspapers  great  controlling  organs   of   opin- 
ion."    Another  says  that   "to  Bennett  must 
be  given  the  credit  of  effecting  a  revolution  in 
the  methods  of  news-getting,   but  to  Greeley 
the  higher  praise  of  improving  upon  his  inven- 
tion ;"    in   other  words,    they   were  the  John 
Fitch   and   the   Robert   Fulton   of   New   York 
journalism.      But   the   most   complete   and   in- 
structive contrast  comes  to  us  from  the  brill- 
iant pen  of  Murat  Halstead  :  "  James  Gordon 
Bennett  was  a  news  man  ;  Horace  Greeley  was 
a  man  of  opinions — ideas,  if  you  please.     Ben- 


THE   EDITOR.  I3I 

nett's  paper  had  the  larger  circulation,  Gree- 
ley's the  greater  influence.  Bennett  was  not 
of  any  political  party,  and  despised  them  all 
and  their  leaders  with  them,  and  laughed  over 
his  own  defeats.  Greeley  was  always  on  high- 
er ground  than  his  party  occupied,  was  hopeful 
of  its  statesmen,  and  grieved  with  a  personal 
sorrow  over  its  discomfitures  ;  .  .  .  but  he  never 
spared  the  rod  among  his  partisans,  when  he 
believed  they  betrayed  the  cause  of  the  peo- 
ple. If  the  qualities  of  the  two  great  journals 
could  have  been  combined,  the  product  would 
have  been  almost  the  ideal  newspaper.'* 


CHAPTER    IX. 

ORATOR  AND   AUTHOR. 

The  generation  preceding  the  war  was  the 
era  of  the  Lyceum  Lecture.  The  "  Lyceum" 
was  instituted  chiefly  as  a  village  syndicate  for 
the  purpose  of  securing  a  series  of  lectures  dur- 
incr  the  winter  from  men  of  distinction,  or  of 
special  knowledge  and  facility  of  address.  In 
the  absence  of  telegraphic  communication  and 
the  scarceness  of  books  and  newspapers,  it  was 
a  real  source  of  mental  and  moral  education, 
as  well  as  the  mild  dissipation  of  secluded  com- 
munities, and  even  held  its  own  respectably 
against  the  theatre  and  the  concert  in  the  larger 
cities.  Of  course,  there  was  a  great  disparity 
of  compensation,  according  to  the  notability 
or  popularity  of  the  lecturer,  extending  from 
the  aspirant  who  was  glad  to  get  a  series  of  en- 
gagements at  ten  to  twenty  dollars  apiece  to 
those  who  could  command  their  hundred,  and 
even  two  or  three  who  were  considered  a  safe 
venture  at  double  that  sum  or  more.  Of 
these  latter  "  giants"  of  the  Lyceum  stage 
were  Henry  Ward  Beecher,  John  B.  Gough, 
and,   later,    De  Witt   Talmage.      Mr.    Greeley 


ORATOR   AND   AUTHOR.  1 33 

seems  to  have  followed  closely  after,  with  a  class 
headed  by  Dr.  Chapin,  Bayard  Taylor,  John  G. 
Saxe,  Theodore  Parker,  Wendell  Phillips  ;  and, 
straggling  along  after  them,  E.  P.  Whipple, 
Horace  Mann,  Oliver  W^endell  Holmes,  Ralph 
Waldo  Emerson,  George  Sumner,  and  quite  a 
legion  of  others.  The  details  and  engage- 
ments of  the  most  eminent  were  usually  made 
by  agents  ;  and,  of  course,  men  like  Mr.  Gree- 
ley could  not  afford  the  time  unless  a  length-* 
ened  and  contiguous  tour  was  arranged  iot 
every  night  in  the  week,  if  possible. 

Mr.  Greeley  would  write  one  or  two  new 
lectures  each  season,  and  probably  lectured  as 
often  as  any  one  who  did  not  devote  his  whole 
attention  to  it.  His  first  recorded  appearance 
in  this  capacity  was  on  January  3d,  1843,  be- 
fore the  "  New  York  Lyceum"  at  the  Broad- 
way Tabernacle,  on  "  Human  Life."  This 
curious  note  is  appended  to  the  self-distrustful 
advertisement  :  "If  those  who  care  to  hear  it 
will  sit  near  the  desk,  they  will  favor  the  lec- 
turer's weak  and  husky  voice."  The  lecturer's 
voice  was  not  weak  nor  husky,  unless  he  hap- 
pened to  have  a  sore  throat  at  the  time.  It 
was  singularly  clear  and  high-pitched,  and  could 
be  distinctly  heard  throughout  the  building, 
capable  of  holding  something  like  three  thou- 
sand. The  mention  of  the  name  of  this,  one 
of  the  most  historic  buildings  in  this  country, — 


134  HORACE   GREELEY. 

the  arena  of  the  great  moral  contests  of  a  most 
tumultuous  and  fateful  generation,  the  Exeter 
Hall  of  America,  the  gathering-place  of  the 
"causes,"  the  is)}is,  the  clans,  and  the  tribes 
of  the  land,  which  has  resounded  with  more 
thunder  and  gleamed  with  more  lightning  of 
unaffected  eloquence  than  almost  any  room 
since  old  Federal  Hall  of  Philadelphia, — will 
bring  many  an  undeadened  memory  of  sacred 
excitement,  of  absorbed  attention,  of  mental 
and  moral  education,  and  even  of  amusing  in- 
cident to  more  than  one  reader's  thought.  It 
was  an  exceedingly  plain,  circular  building,  with 
the  platform  nearly  in  the  centre,  and  deep  rows 
of  low-dipping  galleries  extending  all  around 
the  house. 

How  large  an  audience  and  how  effective  a 
debut  as  lecturer  Horace  Greeley  had,  we  are 
not  informed.  In  his  meridian  of  fame  and 
influence,  he  was  sure  of  a  large  and  inter- 
ested, though  somewhat  nondescript,  audience. 
He  no  more  lectured  for  popularity  or  pecun- 
iary returns,  than  he  edited  the  Tribune  with 
that  view  ;  nor  were  his  lectures  very  different  in 
their  aim  and  scope  from  his  purely  journalistic 
work,  except  that  he  chose  the  less  transient 
topics,  and  elaborated  more  his  style.  They 
were,  in  fact,  little  more  than  editorials  on  legs. 
He  dashed  into  his  theme  without  preface,  and 
in  a  tone  lower  and  a  rate  slower  than  his  later 


ORATOR  AND   AUTHOR.  1 35 

sentences.  His  manner  was  characterized  by 
the  same  awkward  yet  headlong  and  pushing 
action  with  which  he  brushed  through  the 
streets.  He  had  no  gestures,  unless  a  slight 
swing  of  his  hand  and  side  may  be  so  called. 
He  has  been  known  to  begin  a  lecture  by  saying, 
in  his  monotonous  tone  :  "  It  has  been  said  that 
I  am  the  poorest  public  speaker  in  America  ;'* 
and  some  who  meant  graceful  and  musical  ex- 
pression by  good  speaking  were  ready  to  agree 
with  him, — even  such  as  the  lady  who  said  to 
Mr.  Barnum  :  "  Did  you  ever  hear  such  a  te- 
dious, terrible  speaker  ?  But  what  he  said  en- 
chanted every  hearer  !"  He  had  fine  passages 
— some  of  them  full  of  a  sweet  simplicity  and 
picturesqueness,  some  as  tender  as  his  soft  and 
womanly  voice,  and  some  with  the  undertone 
of  a  prophet — but  he  seemed  unconscious  of 
them,  and  of  the  frequent  play  of  humor  which 
lit  up  his  style,  though  not  his  face.  This, 
under  his  spectacles  and  bald  head,  maintained 
throughout  an  almost  moon-like  monotony, 
from  the  moment  when  he  "  looks  up  at  the 
audience  with  an  expression  of  inquiring  be- 
nignity," waiting  for  the  applause  of  his  greet- 
ing to  subside. 

There  was  no  mistaking  his  manner,  how- 
ever. Here  was  a  man  who  **  meant  business" 
with  that  audience.  He  had  something  of  an 
extremely   practical    kind  to  impart,  or  some 


136  HORACE    GREELEY. 

neglected  or  despised  cause  to  argue  before 
them.  Several  of  his  books  are  chiefly  com- 
pilations of  his  lectures,  notably  his  "  Hints 
Toward  Reforms."  His  separate  lectures  have 
all  the  same  trend,  and  nearly  all  the  same  class 
of  topics.  Labor,  Literature,  Life,  Character, 
Education,  Poetry,  Organization,  Capital 
Punishment,  Total  Abstinence,  and  various 
questions  of  Social  and  Political  Economy,  were 
not  essentially  different  in  their  practical  en- 
deavor and  yearning  to  help  and  to  elevate,  to 
liberate  and  to  liberalize  his  fellow-men,  espe- 
cially those  who  in  the  calm  of  country  life  and 
in  the  vast  development  of  our  newer  territory 
were  to  mould  the  character  and  determine  the 
destiny  of  our  country.  These  lectures  were 
still  more  editorial,  in  the  exceeding  rapidity 
with  which  they  were  composed.  "  At  no 
time,"  he  says  in  the  preface  of  a  volume  of 
them,  "  has  it  seemed  practicable  to  devote  a 
whole  day,  seldom  a  full  half  day,  to  the  pro- 
duction of  any  of  them." 

But  lecturing  was  only  a  small  and  occasional 
exercise  of  Horace  Greeley's  oratory.  His 
political  and  campaign  speaking  was  enough  in 
itself  for  one  man  to  do.  He  was  quite  sure 
to  be  called  up  for  a  speech  at  every  gathering, 
whether  mass-meeting  or  public  dinner,  at 
which  he  made  his  appearance,  and  he  not 
only  never  refused,  but  would  sometimes  come 


ORATOR  And  author.  137 

in  and  go  out  with  sole  reference  to  the  fulfil- 
ment of  this  object.  These,  too,  were  brief 
editorials,  pungent  and  direct,  beginning  in 
medias  reSy  and  stopping  on  the  instant  he  had 
said  his  say.  They  were  spoken  in  a  lumber- 
ing manner  and  unvaried  tone,  but  with  as 
logical  arrangement  and  freedom  from  hesita- 
tion as  his  written  lectures.  Some  of  his 
speeches,  in  great  election  canvasses,  rose  to 
the  height  of  orations,  in  their  fulness  and 
mastery  of  treatment,  and  in  their  unconscious 
eloquence,  and  influence  over  assemblies. 
Whatever  he  said  on  any  subject  or  occasion 
was  never  felt  to  be  dry,  much  less  trite,  and 
was  heard  with  close  attention  to  the  end.  He 
had  the  faculty  of  Mr.  Gladstone,  of  making  fig- 
ures eloquent,  if  not  poetic.  If  this  be  not 
oratory,  it  would  be  difficult  to  form  a  defini- 
tion which  would  include  the  essential  effect 
and  end  of  oratory.  One  of  the  most  impor- 
tant and  interesting  of  his  appearances  was  in 
a  public  debate  on  a  ''Resolved,  That  a  Pro- 
tective Tariff  is  conducive  to  our  National 
Prosperity."  It  was  held  in  the  Broadway 
Tabernacle  aforesaid,  February  loth,  1843. 
The  contesting  debaters  were  of  notable  name  : 
Affirmative,  Joseph  Blunt,  then  a  distinguished 
lawyer  and  member  of  a  family  of  distinguished 
lawyers,  and  Horace  Greeley  ;  Negative  : 
Samuel  J.  Tilden  and  Parke  Godwin.      We  do 


138  HORACE    GREELEY. 

not  know  what  the  general  impression  of  the 
discussion  was  ;  but  Mr.  Greeley's  speech  on 
the  occasion  is  a  very  concise  and  practical,  yet 
eminently  readable  and  even  vivacious,  re'siun^ 
of  "  The  Grounds  of  Protection." 

As  has  been  said,  HoraceGreeley'sbooks  were 
chiefly  compilations  of  his  lectures  and  his  let- 
ters, such  as  **  Hints  Toward  Reforms,"  and 
"  Glances  at  Europe,"  composed  of  his  foreign 
correspondence  to  the  Tribune^  both  of  these 
being  published  in  1851.  Other  r/'/j^;;/rr<3;  are  his 
"  Overland  Journey  to  San  Francisco"  (i860), 
"  Essays  Designed  to  Elucidate  the  Science  of 
Political  Economy"  (1870),  and  "  What  I 
Know  About  Farming."  The  last  grew  out 
of  the  previous  publication  of  a  lecture  de- 
livered before  a  State  Agricultural  Society  in 
1853,  on  "  What  the  Sister  Arts  Teach  Us 
About  Farming."  Farming  was  what  Mr. 
Greeley  always  thought  he  took  most  interest 
in,  and  was  most  adapted  to.  It  certainly,  in 
his  later,  and  amateur,  experience,  offered  him 
the  recreative,  if  not  restful,  side  of  his  work. 
Much  fun  has  been  made  of  his  title,  "  What 
I  Know  About  Farming,"  but  it  strikes  us  as 
an  eminently  felicitous  one,  combining  a 
modest  sense  of  his  own  limitations  and  an  as- 
surance to  the  readers  that  he  was  giving  them 
not  theories,  but  facts,  gathered  from  hard  ex- 


ORATOR  AND   AUTHOR.  1 39 

perlence,  and  the  correction  of  early  mistakes 
and  misinstruction.  It  has  never  been  shown 
to  be  an  ignorant  or  a  boastful  book,  and 
therefore  justifies  its  title.  It  is  only  to  be 
wished  that  others  would  spare  us  from  the 
deluge  of  print  and  talk  concerning  what  they 
do  not  know  ;  and  particularly  the  farmers  at  our 
agricultural  fairs,  from  their  hour  and  a  half  of 
platitudes  or  of  second-hand  material.  Horace 
Greeley's  immortal  advice  to  a  young  inquirer, 
**  Go  West,  young  man,  go  West  !"  was  worth 
tons  of  agricultural  addresses,  especially  when 
supplemented  by  his  **  Letter  to  an  Aspiring 
Young  Man." 

His  "  history  of  the  struggle  for  slavery  ex- 
tension" is  substantially  incorporated  into  his 
"  American  Conflict,"  and  constitutes  probably 
its  most  valuable  part.  This,  his  greatest 
achievement  in  book-making,  was  written  at 
the  solicitation  of  Messrs.  Newton  &  Case, 
subscription-book  publishers  of  Hartford,  and 
was  begun  shortly  after  the  battle  of  Gettys- 
burg. It  was  an  enormous  load  to  take  upon 
his  already  overburdened  shoulders  ;  but  it 
was  directly  in  the  line  of  his  work  as  a  pub- 
licist and  a  journalist,  and,  if  successful,  prom- 
ised to  provide  him  with  a  reserve  fund  for  his 
later  years.  It  was  necessary,  of  course,  to 
seclude  himself  during  a  much  larger  part  of 
his  time, — though  even  here  he  was  so  much  in- 


I40  iiUKACE    tJREKLEV. 

truded  upon  that  he  thought  that,  if  he  should 
ever  undertake  such  a  labor  again,  he  should 
allow  the  location  of  his  "  den"  to  be  known 
to  but  one  person  at  the  Tribune  ofifice,  who 
should  be  privileged  to  knock  only  in  extreme 
emergencies,  and  that  the  door  should  open 
only  to  this  person,  to  his  secretary,  and  to 
himself.  He  hired  a  room  on  the  third  floor 
of  the  Bible  House,  in  the  vicinity  of  four 
great  public  libraries,  and  engaged  a  secretary 
to  explore  these  and  other  sources  for  material, 
though  he  often  made  his  own  searches  and 
used  his  own  documents.  His  habit  was  to  go 
to  this  "  workshop"  every  morning  directly  af- 
ter breakfast  and  remain  from  eight  to  ten 
hours,  to  read  and  compare  the  data  collected 
for  his  next  chapter,  or  to  write  one  already 
"  in  mind."  He  usually  wrote  his  first  draught, 
merely  indicating  the  longer  extracts  and  quo- 
tations for  his  secretary  to  fill  in  when  he 
transcribed  the  whole  ;  but  he  sometimes  dic- 
tated to  the  secretary,  who  took  shorthand 
notes  and  wrote  them  out  at  his  leisure.  This 
composing  of  what  he  had  been  for  some  time 
collecting,  digesting,  and  preparing,  was  done 
with  great  rapidity.  His  first  chapter  was 
composed  at  one  sitting,  and  not  more  than 
two  or  three  days  were  given  to  his  longest 
chapters.  He  thinks  that  the  material  was 
more  copious  than  that  from  which  the  history 


ORATOR  AND   AUTHOR.  I4I 

of  any  former  event  was  written,  yet  even  after 
passing  many  revisions  and  recastings,  realizes 
it  to  be  "  exceedingly  imperfect  and  contra- 
dictory. ' '  Still  he  indulges  the  hope  that  *  *  The 
American  Conflict"  will  long  be  consulted,  at 
least  by  historians. 

His  hope  has  been  realized.  We  think  that 
few  will  question  Professor  C.  K.  Adams's  al- 
ways guarded  criticism  that  "  the  first  half  of 
the  first  volume  is  perhaps  the  best  existing 
portrayal  of  the  causes  that  led  gradually  up 
to  the  conflict  ;"  and  that  "  it  is  .  .  .  quite 
the  most  interesting  of  the  numerous  accounts 
of  our  great  civil  contest."  Whether  this 
judgment,  delivered  in  1882,  would  be  modified 
by  subsequent  and  more  pretentious  histories  is 
still  to  be  determined.  Of  course  these  latter 
have  a  vast  advantage  in  the  increase  and  sift- 
ing of  military  data,  including  the  matured  and 
authoritative  testimony  of  the  chief  actors  in 
those  events  ;  and,  moreover,  Mr.  Greeley  not 
only  was  not  a  man  of  military  education  or 
experience,  but  was  throughout  the  war  singu- 
larly unconscious  of  his  fallibility  as  a  strate- 
gist. The  "  interest"  is  undoubted.  Horace 
Greeley  could  hardly  write  anything  which  had 
not  the  tense  and  terse,  the  real  and  glowing 
qualities  which  are  the  elements  of  interest. 
A  distinguished  political  opponent  aptly  char- 
acterized "  The  American   Conflict"   as   "  the 


142  HORACE   GREELEY. 

fairest  one-sided  book  ever  written."  The 
spirit  and  intent  of  its  author  are  impressively 
stated  in  this  sentence  :  "I  proffer  it  as  my 
contribution  toward  a  fuller  and  more  vivid 
realization  of  the  truth  that  God  governs  this 
world  by  moral  laws  as  active,  immutable,  and 
all-pervading  as  can  be  operative  in  any  other, 
and  that  every  collusion  or  compromise  with 
evil  must  surely  invoke  a  prompt  and  signal 
retribution." 

The  first  volume,  dedicated  to  John  Bright, 
appeared  in  1864,  and  the  second,  dedicated  to 
the  "  Union  Volunteers,"  in  1866.  The  sales 
were  large  and  rapid,  till,  as  a  result  of  the  part 
which  Mr.  Greeley  took  in  the  bailing  of  Jeffer- 
son Davis,  they  ceased  altogether  for  a  time. 

The  work  by  which  Horace  Greeley  will 
longest  survive  as  an  author  is  undoubtedly  his 
* '  Recollections  of  a  Busy  Life, "  originally  pub- 
lished in  the  New  York  Ledger,  and  republished 
in  book  form,  much  enlarged  and  partly  re- 
written, in  1868.  They  are  literally  "  recollec- 
tions," being  written  with  not  even  a  scrap  of 
memoranda.  Hence  they  belong  to  the  most 
genuine  and  delightful  class  of  autobiography, 
— that  unstudied  and  confidential  talk  about 
himself  to  which  the  Autobiography  of  Ben- 
jamin Franklin  (to  whom  he  bore  so  many  anal- 
ogies) belongs.  There  are  those  who,  like  the 
writer,  regard  these    **  Recollections"    among 


ORATOR  AND   AUTHOR.  1 43 

the  most  charming,  vital,  and  nutritious  of  his 
books.  So  competent  and  wide  a  reader  as  Dr, 
T.  L.  Cuyler  has  told  me  that  this  is  one  of  ten 
or  a  dozen  books  which  he  reads  and  re-reads, 
and  always  keeps  within  reach.  It  is  largely 
taken  up  with  his  opinions,  but  even  these  are 
not  less  autobiographic,  for  this  man's  mind, 
its  growth,  its  conclusions,  and  its  contests, 
were  himself.  This  was  the  part  of  him  whose 
hat  and  overcoat  and  boots  were  never  neglect- 
ed, nor  slouched.  In  fact,  he  says  that  his 
object  in  tardily  consenting  to  VvTiting  the 
"  Recollections"  was  the  "opportunity  to  com- 
mend to  many  thousands  of  mainly  young  per- 
sons, convictions  which  are  a  part  of  my  being, 
and  conceptions  of  public  events  and  interests 
which  would  never  otherwise  so  fairly  invoke 
their  attention.  ...  If,  then,  my  friends  will 
accept  the  essays  which  conclude  this  volume 
as  a  part  of  my  mental  biography,  I  respect- 
fully proffer  this  book  as  my  account  of  all  of 
myself  that  is  worth  their  consideration  ;  and 
I  will  cherish  the  hope  that  some  portion,  at 
least,  of  its  contents  embody  lessons  of  persist- 
ency and  patience  which  will  not  have  been  set 
forth  in  vain." 

There  are  probably  few  who  associate  Hor- 
ace Greeley  with  the  writing  of  poetry.  And 
yet  his  spring  of  life  shook  off  its  spray  of  song, 
like  nearly  all  of  us.   He  wrote  most  of  his  verses 


144  HORACE   GREELEY. 

— said  to  amount  in  all  to  about  thirty-five 
pieces — for  the  New  Yorker^  though  some  ap- 
peared in  the  magazines  and  "  Annuals"  of 
that  period.  They  were  marked  by  the  gen- 
eral character  of  American  poetry  of  the  time, 
superabounding  in  heroic  phrase  and  romantic 
sentiment.  Yet  they  will  bear  comparison  with 
much  of  what  appeared  in  "  Collections"  of 
those  days.  Mr.  Parton  has  rescued  several 
from  oblivion,  among  which  is  his  ode  to  Will- 
iam Wirt,  "  the  ideal  of  his  youthful  politics  ;" 
and  some  specimens  of  what  he  called  * '  Historic 
Pencillings," — that  is  to  say,  verses  springing 
out  of  his  impressions  of  early  historical  read- 
ing. Death  and  melancholy  seem  to  have 
reigned  over  his  verse,  as  was  the  fashion  then. 
The  only  one  which  confesses  to  the  "  tender 
passion"  is,  of  course,  the  saddest  of  all,  and 
ends  with  a  despairing  "  farewell  !"  One  more 
may  be  adverted  to,  written  on  a  loftier  key, 
and  doubtless  interpreting  much  that  was  real 
and  true  in  the  author's  inmost  mind.  After 
expressing  the  changed  look  which  had  come 
over  nature  and  life,  as  he  had  more  deeply 
learned  the  want  and  woe  and  wrong  which 
underlay  them,  he  says  : 

"  Yet  mourn  not  I, — a  stern,  high  duty 

Now  nerves  my  arm  and  fires  my  brain  ; 
Perish  the  dream  of  shapes  of  beauty, 
So  that  this  strife  be  not  in  vain  ! 


ORATOR  AND   AUTHOR.  I45 

»         *  To  war  on  fraud  intrenched  with  power, 

On  smooth  pretense  and  specious  wrong, 
This  task  be  mine,  though  fortune  lower  ; 
For  this  be  banished  sky  and  song." 

So,  too,  was  banished  the  Muse  herself  at 
a  very  early  date  ;  and,  accordingly,  when  it 
was  proposed  by  Mr.  Bonner  to  make  a  collec- 
tion of  poems  not  found  in  Dana's  *'  House- 
hold Book  of  Poetry,"  he  utterly  refused  to 
allow  his  verse  to  appear,  bluntly  saying  :  "  I 
am  no  poet,  and  never  shall  be.  ...  I  never 
was,  even  in  the  mists  of  deluding  fancy.  .  .  . 
Within  the  last  ten  years  I  have  been  accused 
of  all  possible  and  some  impossible  offences 
against  good  taste,  good  morals,  and  the  com- 
mon weal, — I  have  been  branded  aristocrat, 
communist,  infidel,  hypocrite,  demagogue,  dis- 
unionist,  traitor,  corruptionist,  etc., — but  I  can- 
not remember  that  any  one  has  flung  in  my 
face  my  youthful  transgressions  in  the  way  of 
rhyme." 

In  support  of  his  modest  claim,  in  one  of  his 
letters,  '*  of  knowing  poetry  from  prose,"  the 
reader  is  directed  to  his  lecture  on  "  Poets  and 
Poetry,"  which  is  extremely  good  reading, 
whether  for  profit  or  entertainment.  Few,  if 
any,  so  capable  critics  have  dared  to  speak  out 
plainly  what  he  thought,  irrespective  of  estab- 
lished or  fashionable  canons.  Homer,  Virgil, 
and   all  from  the   Augustan   age   to   Dante, — 


146  HORACE    GREELEY. 

and  Dante  himself, — Mr,  Greeley  thought,  had 
much  of  the  tedious  and  monotonous.  He 
gives  the  palm  to  the  Greek  tragedists.  The 
Romans  were  not  poets.  Chaucer  and  Spenser 
were  bores,  and  there  is  a  great  deal  to  be  dis- 
counted even  from  Shakespeare.  After  Milton, 
he  seems  to  find  little  true  poetry,  as  distin- 
guished from  rhymed  philosophy,  till  Burns, 
the  embodied  voice  of  the  people.  Keats  was 
the  morning  star  of  the  new  era.  Byron  was 
its  greatest  name.  Coleridge,  Campbell,  and 
Southey — the  world  would  lose  little,  if  with- 
out them.  Hood,  Tennyson,  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Browning,  and,  of  course,  Mrs.  Hemans, 
seem  to  have  gone  most  to  his  heart.  Truly, 
a  modern  of  moderns,  and  a  democrat  of  dem- 
ocrats !  In  a  letter  to  N.  P.  Willis,  we  find 
him  urging  that  gentleman  to  make  a  volume 
of  selections  from  his  writings  for  his  son,  so 
that  he  might  try  *'  Unwritten  Music"  on  him, 
*'  and  see  if  it  impresses  him  at  sixteen  as  it 
did  me  at  about  that  age,  when  it  appeared." 
Another  instance  of  his  independence  in  liter- 
ary judgment  is  to  be  found  in  the  fact  that  his 
seems  to  have  been  about  the  only  voice  which 
was  raised  in  defence  of  Dickens's  "  American 
Notes,"  as  a  calm,  gentlemanly,  candid,  and 
correct  judgment  of  what  the  writer  saw,  and 
confirmatory  of  the  soundness  of  his  head  and 
the    goodness    of    his    heart.     Mr.   Greeley's 


ORATOR  AND   AUTHOR.  I47 

views  of  literature  are  to  be  found  in  one  of  his 
most  brilliant  and  interesting  lectures.  He 
especially  deprecates  and  would  dissuade  from 
adopting  literature  as  a  *  *  vocation. "  He  says  : 
"  Literature  is  a  noble  calling  only  when  the 
call  issues  from  a  world  to  be  enlightened  and 
blessed,  not  from  a  void  stomach  clamoring  to 
be  gratified  and  filled/' 


CHAPTER    X. 

THE    REFORMER. 

In  our  childhood,  and  in  the  conservative 
circles  in  which  we  received  our  first  impres- 
sions, Horace  Greeley  was  quite  a  bete  ?wir. 
The  Tribune  was  regarded  as  an  equally  dan- 
gerous visitor  at  the  home  with  the  Herald^ 
though  for  a  different  reason  ;  and  we  were 
brought  up  on  the  milk-and-water  diet  of  the 
E.  and  T.  Brooks's  Express,  and  the  "  deport- 
ment" of  Colonel  Watson  Webb's  Courier  and 
Enquirer y — of  course,  none  but  Whig  papers 
were  admitted.  There  was  a  time  when  Hor- 
ace Greeley  was  vigorously  denounced  by  the 
solid  men  of  America  over  their  wine,  and  by 
timid  and  amiable  spinsters  over  their  tea,  as 
hardly  less  perilous  and  improper  than  we  now 
regard  a  Chicago  anarchist.  At  any  rate  he 
was  generally  viewed  as  having  an  abnormal 
appetite  for  innovation,  if  not  destruction. 

But  he  was  neither.  He  was  essentially  and 
in  all  things  a  reformer,  in  the  literal  meaning 
of  that  word — not  to  disorganize,  but  to  re- 
form. The  fact  is,  that  by  temperament  and 
training  he  had  a  singularly  independent  mind, 


THE   REFORMER.  I49 

and  as  singularly  inquiring.  Without  an 
ounce  of  veneration  for  the  old  or  established 
as  such,  he  went  straight  to  every  chambered 
idea  and  institution  of  the  past,  and  picked  its 
lock,  however  rusty,  peering  in  with  eyes 
neither  blinded  by  its  dazzle  nor  its  dimness, 
intent  upon  furbishing  and  rendering  it  more 
tenantable  for  men.  Society  was  to  him  a 
great  fair,  full  of  patent  improvements  and  la- 
bor-saving machines.  And  Horace  was  a  star- 
ing Moses  in  the  Fair,  with  perhaps  much  of 
the  foolish  credulity  of  Goldsmith's  hero,  as 
well  as  a  good  deal  of  the  keen  and  wide-look- 
ing wisdom  which  we  associate  with  that  name 
in  its  highest  example  of  the  great  Hebrew  re- 
former. That  pure  and  benevolent  face  was 
an  unmistakable  index,  for  it  wore  an  inquisi- 
tive and  puzzled  look,  as  of  one  who  had  never 
recovered  from  the  surprise  and  impatience  at 
having  opened  his  eyes  on  such  a  world  of  dis- 
order, wrong,  and  impenetrability  to  love  and 
light. 

He  was  by  heredity  and  by  idiosyncrasy  a 
puritan  of  the  puritans.  The  intensity  of  his 
moral  perception  and  sensibility  made  him  in- 
quisitive and  seemingly  irreverent.  It  armed 
him  also  with  a  moral  courage  to  attempt  all 
things,  and  to  strike  through  kings.  He  was 
so  mastered  by  his  moral  sense  that  it  made 
him  masterful  in  his  attitude  toward  other  men, 


150  HORACE   GREELEY. 

and  intolerant  of  their  opinions.  He  had  the 
imperiousness  of  a  Cromwell,  and  his  rudeness 
of  speech.  He  was  ascetic  and  unconventional, 
from  absorbing  earnestness  of  aim.  That  aim 
was  a  social  kingdom  of  God  on  earth,  a  veri- 
table and  visible  reign  of  righteousness.  And 
yet  his  was  a  New  Testament,  and  not  an  Old 
Testament  puritanism, — not  that  of  Balfour  of 
Burley,  but  of  John  the  Baptist.  While  rec- 
ognizing Christ's  principle,  "  I  came  not  to 
bring  peace,  but  a  sword,"  he  heard  also  the 
deeper  strain,  **  My  peace  I  give  you" — a 
peace  through  the  sword  of  the  Spirit  and  of 
the  naked  truth.  He  was  an  intense  lover  of 
peace,  a  passion  which  furnishes  the  key  to 
much  of  the  apparent  halting  and  inconsistency 
of  his  career,  as  his  reforming  impulse  consti- 
tutes the  underlying  motive  and  the  clew  to 
his  strange  and  stormy  career  as  a  whole.  He 
was  not  a  lover  of  confusion,  but  of  order.  He 
was  essentially  a  critic,  and  hence  a  censor  of 
life  ;  a  lover  of  his  kind,  and  of  those  things 
which  make  for  peace,  and  whereby  one  may 
edify  another.  And  yet  so  practical  was  his 
turn  of  mind  that  he  was  not  content  to  dream 
and  write  of  Utopias  and  Platonic  Republics, 
but  must  achieve  something  tangible,  must 
bring  the  working  model  of  his  idea  into  house- 
hold and  every-day  use.  It  was  not  his  ambi- 
tion to  "  hitch  his  wagon  to  a  star,"  but  rather 


THE    REFORMER.  151 

to  somehow  bring  down  the  star  where  it  might 
save  horse-power  on  our  rough  roads,  and  to 
fight  against  the  Siseras  of  bad  government 
and  social  evils.  He  was  a  reformer  not  of  the 
Rousseau  type,  but  of  the  John  Bright. 

Did  he  not  show  these  qualities  in  his  very 
face  ?  Was  there  ever  a  countenance  more 
strangely  combining — even  ludicrously  so — 
keen  inquiry  and  almost  vacant  innocency, 
benevolence  and  belligerency,  gentleness  and 
defiance,  speculation  and  scrutiny,  a  far-away 
expression,  combined  with  a  straightforward- 
ness of  look  which  could  brook  no  convention- 
ality or  circumlocution,  and  hardly  an  objec- 
tion. 

As  his  reforming  tendencies  are  the  clew  to 
his  entire  career,  so  it  is  not  difficult  to  find 
the  clews  to  the  specific  reforms  which  most 
engaged  his  advocacy.  They  are,  first  and 
foremost,  an  intense  passion  for  justice  to  all 
and  to  each,  and  a  chivalric  impulse  to  espouse 
the  cause  even  of  an  enemy  or  a  criminal,  whom 
he  deemed  to  be  denied  his  right.  Like  unto 
it,  was  his  constitutional  sympathy  for  the 
weaker  side  in  the  struggle,  even  though  in 
the  day  of  its  power  it  had  borne  itself  in- 
solently and  oppressively.  To  these  are  to 
be  added  a  tender-heartedness,  which  could 
not  endure  the  sight  of  suffering  and  was 
constantly  overshadowed   by  a  vicarious   sor- 


152  HORACE   GREELEY. 

row,  and  rendered  stern  by  its  seemingly 
hopeless  problems.  His  very  kindness  of 
nature  had  contributed  to  make  his  exterior 
rough  and  prickly.  He  was  a  journalistic  Boy- 
thorne,  whose  most  savage  and  exaggerated 
expressions  veiled  a  gentleness  which  unduly 
shrank  from  sentimentality,  and  in  his  case  a 
practicality  which  must  translate  itself  into  ac- 
tion. It  was  due  not  to  a  theoretical  disposi- 
tion, but  to  his  intensely  practical  turn,  that  he 
was  "  ready  to  listen  to  any  plan  that  promised 
to  promote  the  material  or  spiritual  welfare  of 
society,  from  the  construction  of  a  plough  to 
the  establishment  of  a  phalanstery." 

We  should  also  say  that  much  of  Horace 
Greeley's  exaggerated  reputation  for  radicalism 
and  innovation,  was  due  to  that  personal  inde- 
pendence and  love  of  free  speech  and  fair  play, 
which  led  him  to* open  his  columns  to  the  pro- 
pounding of  novel  and  unpopular  opinions. 
"  We  have  plenty  of  requests, "  he  said  in  one  of 
the  earlier  numbers  of  the  Tribune,  "to  blow 
up  all  sorts  of  abuses,  which  shall  be  attended 
to  as  fast  as  possible."  He  had  the  courage  to 
give  the  Dial,  the  organ  of  the  much- ridiculed 
transcendentalists,  not  only  appreciative  no- 
tices, but  a  full  hearing  in  the  form  of  copious 
extracts.  So  he  gave  fair  and  ample  and 
courteous  reports  of  conventions,  without  ref- 
erence  to   his   own    position  or  that  of  public 


THE   REFORMER.  I  53 

sentiment.  It  was  to  the  distastefulness  of 
this  course  that  the  starting  of  the  New  York 
Times  was  due,  and  its  immediate  success  as 
a  cautious,  conservative,  and  "proper"  Whig 
journal.  It  is  said  to  have  attained  a  circula- 
tion of  more  than  twenty  thousand  at  a  bound. 
Mr.  Greeley  thus  explains  his  policy  as  late  as 
April,  1859,  speaking  of  the  "  isms''  of  the 
Tribune^  its  hobbies,  and  its  "disorganizing 
doctrines  ": 

"  One  mind  has  presided  over  its  issues  from 
the  outset  ;  so  one  golden  thread  of  purpose 
may  be  traced  through  them  all,  under  every 
variety  of  circumstance  and  condition.  That 
purpose  is  the  elevation  of  the  masses,  through 
the  diffusion  and  inculcation  of  intelligence, 
freedom,  industry,  skill,  virtue,  and  the  conse- 
quent abolition  or  limitation  of  ignorance, 
idleness,  pauperism,  and  vice.  To  accord  a 
generous  welcome  to  every  novel  suggestion, 
every  unselfish  effort,  tending  to  the  great  end 
thus  meditated — whether  that  suggestion  con- 
template the  more  perfect  development  and 
diversification  of  our  material  industry  through 
protection  to  American  labor,  or  improved 
facilities  of  intercourse  with  our  brethren  across 
the  continent  by  a  railroad  to  the  Pacific,  or 
the  present  limitation  and  ultimate  abolition  of 
human  chattlehood,  or  the  securing  to  every 
man  the  unchallenged  possession  and  use  of  a 


154  HORACE   GREELEY. 

patch  of  the  earth's  surface,  whereon  to  live 
and  support  his  family,  by  the  freedom  of  the 
public  lands,  or  the  diminution  of  human 
wretchedness  and  debasement  through  a  war 
of  extermination  on  intemperance  and  its  ac- 
cessories— is,  as  it  has  been,  our  unshaken  pur- 
pose, our  unshrinking  aim."  And  yet  this 
lofty  and  liberty-loving  policy  of  "  seeking  first 
the  kingdom  of  God"  had  the  "all  things 
else"  added  to  it.  Even  the  twenty  thousand 
of  the  Times  made  no  perceptible  inroads  upon 
the  circulation  of  the  Tribune  for  the  corre- 
sponding year.  Mr.  Greeley  only  increased 
thereby  his  proportions  and  notableness  in  the 
public  eye,  and  the  eager  interest  taken  in  his 
paper.  He  exemplified  the  words  of  a  psalmist, 
"  In  those  days  a  man  was  famous  as  he  lifted 
up  axes  on  the  thick  trees." 

One  of  Mr.  Greeley's  most  interesting  lec- 
tures, which  has  been  preserved,  is  that  in 
which  he  interprets  his  own  views  of  "  Reforms 
and  Reformers."  Referring  to  the  needs  of 
nature  and  the  corresponding  impulses  of  man 
toward  improvement,  he  bases  his  discussion 
upon  the  proposition  :  "  Man  is,  therefore,  by 
primal  necessity  a  transformer— in  other  words, 
a  Reformer."  In  answer  to  those  who  em- 
phasize this  as  a  reform  of  man's  exter?tal  cir- 
cumstances,  and  who  urge  that  the  end  they 
meditate  is  to  be  attained  from  witJiin  rather 


THE   REFORMER.  1 55 

than  from  without, — "  by  improvement,  not  of 
this  or  that  czrcu7nst3ince,  but  of  the  vital  centre- 
stance," — he  asserts  the  prime  importance  of 
"  Opportunity,"  holding  that  "  there  is  no 
practical  cure  for  the  vital  woes  of  the  pitiable 
which  does  not  involve  a  preliminary  change  in 
their  outward  conditions.  .  .  .  Begin  by  giv- 
ing back  to  him  the  earth  which  you  have  taken 
from  under  his  feet,  the  knowledge  you  have 
monopolized,  the  privileges  you  have  en- 
grossed ;  and  we  can  better  determine  whether 
he  needs  anything  (and  what)  from  your  char- 
ity, after  he  shall  have  recovered  what  is  right- 
fully his  own." 

Here  is  a  sentence  in  which  he  unconsciously 
reveals  much  of  his  own  deepest  life  :  **  It  is  a 
fearful  gift,  this  of  moral  prescience, — the  abil- 
ity and  the  will  to  look  straight  into  and 
through  all  traditions,  usages,  beliefs,  conven- 
tionalities, garnitures,  and  ask,  What  is  this 
for  ?  What  does  it  signify  ?  If  it  were  swept 
away,  what  would  be  really  lost  to  mankind  ? 
.  .  .  Well  does  a  deep  thinker  speak  of  the 
spirit  of  reform  as  walking  up  and  down,  *  pav- 
ing the  world  with  eyes/ — eyes  which  not 
merely  inquire  and  pierce,  but  challenge,  ac- 
cuse, arraign  also.  Happily  was  the  prophet 
of  old  named  a  seer ;  for  he  who  rightly  and 
deeply  sees,  thence /i^^-^sees." 

Here  seems  to  be  the  clew  to  Horace  Gree- 


156  HORACE   GREELEY. 

ley's  habits  of  simple  and  even  austere  living, 
his  vegetarianism,  his  total  abstinence  :  "  The 
true  reformer  turns  his  eyes  first  inward,  scru- 
tinizing himself,  his  habits,  purposes,  efforts, 
enjoyments, — asking,  What  signifies  this  ?  and 
this  ?  and  wherein  is  its  justification  ?  This  daily 
provision  of  meat  and  drink — is  its  end  nour- 
ishment, and  its  incident  enjoyment  (or  the  re- 
verse) ?  .  .  .  Why  should  a  score  of  animals 
render  up  their  lives  to  furnish  forth  my  day's 
dinner,  if  my  own  life  is  thereby  rendered 
neither  surer  nor  nobler  ?  Why  gorge  myself 
with  dainties  which  cloud  the  brain  and  clog 
the  step,  if  the  common  grains  and  fruits  and 
roots  and  water,  furnish  precisely  the  same  sus- 
tenance in  simpler  and  less  cloying  guise,  and 
are  far  more  conducive  to  health,  strength, 
elasticity,  longevity  ?  .  .  .  Above  all,  why 
should  I  fire  my  blood  and  sear  my  brain  with 
liquors,  which  give  a  temporary  exhilaration 
to  the  spirits  at  the  cost  of  permanent  deprava- 
tion and  disorder  to  the  whole  physical  frame  ? 
.  .  .  And  thus  the  sincere  reformer  in  the 
very  outset  of  his  career  becomes  a  '  teetotal  ' 
fanatic,  represented  by  the  knavish  and  re- 
garded by  the  vulgar  as  a  foe  to  all  enjoyment 
and  cheer,  insisting  that  mankind  shall  con- 
form to  his  crotchets,  and  live  on  bran  bread 
and  blue  cold  water." 

Here   is  his  plea  for   socialism  :    "  Turning 


THE   REFORMER.  I  57 

his  eyes  away  from  himself,  he  (the  Reformer) 
scans  the  relation  of  man  with  man,  under 
which  labor  is  performed  and  service  secured, 
and  finds  not  absolute  justice,  much  less  love, 
but  necessity  on  the  one  hand,  advantage  on 
the  other,  presiding  over  the  general  inter- 
change of  good  offices  among  mankind.  .  .  . 
One  man's  necessity  being  another's  opportu- 
nity, we  have  no  right  to  be  surprised  or  indig- 
nant that  the  general  system  culminates,  by  an 
inexorably  logical  process,  in  the  existence  and 
stubborn  maintenance  of  human  slavery." 
He  frankly  admits  the  many  failures  of  social- 
istic experiment,  and  admits  that  the  sceptics 
are  justified  in  doubting  whether  a  more  trust- 
ful and  beneficent  social  order  than  the  prevail- 
ing one  is  practicable,  and  in  concluding  that 
**  the  family  is  the  only,  or  at  least  the  highest, 
social  organization  whereof  poor,  depraved  hu- 
man nature  is  capable,"  and  yet  he  lacks  not 
heart  of  grace  to  argue  and  believe  that  "  a 
more  Christian  social  order  is  not  impossible," 
though  his  only  example — that  of  the  Shakers 
— is  not  a  wholly  felicitous  one.  "  Legisla- 
tors !  philanthropists  !"  he  cries  (he  seems  to 
be  writing  in  some  winter  of  peculiar  distress 
and  lack  of  employment),  "  here  are  two 
classes  stand  facing,  eying  each  other — a  thin 
plate  of  glass  dividing  them — the  man  within 
anxious  to  sell,  and  he  without  eager  to  buy  ; 


158  HORACE    GREELEY. 

yet  some  malignant  spell  seems  to  keep  them 
still  blankly,  helplessly  staring  at  each  other. 
There  must  be  some  way  out  of  this  social 
labyrinth,  for  God  is  good,  and  has  not  creat- 
ed men  and  women  to  starve  for  want  of  work. 
.  .  .  The  great,  the  all-embracing  reform  of 
our  age  is  therefore  the  Social  Reform,  that 
which  seeks  to  lift  the  laboring  class,  as  such, 
— not  out  of  labor,  by  any  means,  but  out  of 
ignorance,  inefficiency,  dependence,  and  want, 
and  to  place  them  in  a  position  of  partnership 
and  recognized  mutual  helpfulness  with  the 
suppliers  of  the  capital  which  they  render  fruit- 
ful and  efficient."  He  thus  paints  his  ideal  : 
"  A  community  or  little  world  wherein  all  free- 
ly serve,  and  all  are  amply  served  ;  wherein 
each  works  according  to  his  tastes  or  needs,  and 
is  paid  for  all  he  does  or  brings  to  pass  ;  where- 
in education  is  free  and  common  as  air  and  sun- 
shine ;  wherein  drones  and  sensualists  cannot 
abide  the  social  atmosphere,  but  are  expelled 
by  a  quiet,  wholesome  fermentation  ;  wherein 
humbugs  and  charlatans  necessarily  find  their 
level  ;  and  naught  but  actual  service,  tested 
by  the  severest  ordeals,  can  secure  approbation, 
and  none  but  sterling  qualities  win  esteem," 

After  a  brief  but  emphatic  reference  to  the 
abolition  of  capital  punishment,  he  concludes 
an  equally  brief  one  on  educational  reform  with 
these  eminently  sensible,  and  not  at  all  radical, 


THE    REFORMER.  I  59 

remarks  :  **  You  may  eulogize  the  Dignity  of 
Labor  till  doomsday,  without  making  a  boot- 
black's calling  as  honorable  as  that  of  an  en- 
gineer or  a  draughtsman  ;  and  so  long  as  an 
ignorant  and  stupid  boor  shall  be  esteemed 
wise  enough,  learned  enough,  for  a  competent 
farmer  or  mechanic,  all  spread-eagle  glorifica- 
tion of  manual  labor  will  be  demagogue  cant 
and  office-seeking  hypocrisy." 

His  sketches  of  typical  reformers  is  full  of 
mingled  amusement  and  pathos.  He  frankly 
admits  their  personal  defects  as  a  class,  and 
their  frequent  unsavoriness  as  individuals  :  "I 
have  met  several  in  my  day  who  were  quite 
confident  of  their  ability  to  correct  Euclid's 
geometry,  or  upset  Newton's  theory  of  grav- 
itation ;  but  I  doubt  whether  one  of  them 
could  have  earned  or  borrowed  two  hundred 
dollars  in  the  course  of  a  year  ;  and  nothing 
stumps  an  average  reforrner  of  things  in  general 
so  completely  as  to  be  asked  to  settle  his  board- 
bill.  I  can  guess  with  what  awed  apprehension 
the  green  disciple  comes  up  from  some  rural 
hamlet  or  out-of-the-way  village  to  the  metrop- 
olis, there  to  meet  for  the  first  time  the  oracle 
of  some  great  movement  for  the  regeneration 
of  the  world,  whose  writings  he  has  devoured 
with  wondering  admiration  ;  and  with  what 
blank  surprise  he  finds  himself  introduced  at 
some  club-house  or  restaurant  to  said  oracle — 


l6o  HORACE    GREELEV. 

a  spindling,  chattering,  personally  insignificant 
entity."  Analyzing  the  genus  Reformer,  he 
finds  the  following  species  :  The  first  and 
lowest  class  are  the  envious  ;  akin  to  this  class, 
that  of  the  devotees  of  the  sensual  appetite  ; 
a  small  class  whom  mere  force  of  will,  or  rather 
a  spirit  of  antagonism,  impels  into  the  service 
of  reform.  "  One  of  the  chief  sorrows  of  the 
reformer's  lot  is  the  embarrassment  of  headlong 
allies.  He  can  never  say  '  A  '  without  some 
one  else  following  with  a  *  B,'  which  he  is  sure 
does  not  belong  to  the  same  alphabet."  He 
considers  the  moral  dangers  of  the  reformer's 
calling  as  even  more  disheartening  than  its  pe- 
cuniary discouragements.  **  *  Do  you  know,' 
said  a  broken-down  ex-lecturer  for  temperance, 
anti-slavery,  etc.,  once  to  me,  in  a  tone  and 
with  a  look  of  deep  meaning,  '  that  there  is 
no  life  so  imJiealthy  as  that  of  a  popular  agita- 
tor ?  '  " 

Was  there  not  just  a  trace  of  the  prophetic  in 
his  allusion  to  that  "  most  instructive  spectacle 
of  an  impulsive  young  radical  undergoing  a 
gradual  transformation  into  a  staid,  respectable 
conservative"  ?  and  again  :  "  Many  a  fiery 
radical  has  been  cooled  down  into  placid  (or 
acrid)  conservatism  by  discovering  that  the 
character  of  his  associates,  the  tendency  of  their 
doctrines,  the  ends  which  they  contemplated, 
were  such  as  he  could  never  approve"  ?     Cer- 


THE   REFORMER.  l6l 

taiiily  he  modified  his  advocacy  of  many  of  his 
own  early  and  pet  reforms,  if  he  did  not  cast 
them  off  altogether,  and  was  as  much  denounced 
for  a  conservative  at  his  latter  end  as  he  was 
reviled  and  persecuted  for  radicalism  in  the 
beginning. 

When  we  come  to  analyze  the  **  reforms*' 
with  which  Horace  Greeley's  name  is  connect- 
ed, we  find  that  for  the  most  part  he  simply 
bore  his  part  with  the  mass  of  thinking  and 
philanthropic  men  of  his  day.  Of  this  class 
were,  his  struggle  against  slavery  extension,  his 
co-operation  in  the  total-abstinence  movement, 
his  advocacy  of  the  abolition  of  the  death  pen- 
alty, and  his  early  championship  of  the  removal 
of  vvom.an's  disabilities  and  the  enlargement  of 
her  sphere  of  labor  and  opportunity.  In  none 
of  these  did  he  identify  himself  with  the  ex- 
tremists of  those  movements.  Besides  these, 
he  toyed  with  two  or  three  erratic  experiments, 
such  as  vegetarianism  and  spirit-rappings, — the 
latter  simply  in  curiosity  and  with  a  final  ad- 
verse verdict,  and  the  former  with  large  modi- 
fication in  practice,  if  not  a  virtual  abandon- 
ment, in  his  later  years.  These  we  shall  mere- 
ly touch  upon  a  little  farther  on.  This  leaves 
just  one  reform  measure  which  can  fairly  be 
regarded  as  radical,  or  as  a  specialty  of  the  man, 
— his  favorable  attitude  toward  the  socialistic 
philosophy  taught  by  Fourier,  and  attempted 


1 62  HORACE   GREELEY. 

by  various  practical  experiments  in  this  coun- 
try.    He  might  have  said  with  the  Moor  : 

"  The  very  head  and  front  of  my  offending 
Hath  this  extent — no  more." 

Horace  Greeley's  course  on  the  question  of 
slavery  is  so  involved  in  his  political  career, 
which  we  shall  narrate  at  length  elsewhere,  that 
little  need  be  said  here.  He  was  educated  in 
a  hearty  disapproval  of  that  system,  but  it  was 
not  till  he  became  convinced  that  the  slave 
power  was  the  aggressor,  and  not  on  its  de- 
fence, that  he  favored  political  action,  and  then 
only  under  the  strict  letter  of  the  Constitution, 
and  confined  to  the  narrow  sphere  of  the  Fed- 
eral jurisdiction.  He  never  was  an  Abolitionist 
till  the  slaveholding  States  had  forfeited  their 
rights  by  rebellion,  and  when  he  saw  that 
emancipation  was  necessary  to  military  success 
and  the  secure  re-establishment  of  the  Union. 
From  that  time  on  he  was  peremptory  in  his 
demands,  and  unswerving  throughout  all  his 
most  conciliatory,  if  not  retrogressive,  views 
of  peace  and  reconstruction.  He  was  always 
a  Whig,  which  in  this  country  stood  for  politi- 
cal conservatism.  As  aFree-soilerand  Repub- 
lican, his  place  was  not  with  the  radicals  of  the 
party,  as  regarded  measures,  though  his  Boy- 
thorn-ism  rendered  his  language  often  liable  to 
extreme  and  offensive  interpretation,  both 
North  and  South  ;   in  fact,  his  attitude  became 


THE    REFORMER.  1 63 

more  and  more  antagonistic  to  the  left  wing  of 
his  party,  till  the  dominance  of  that  element 
forced  him  to  break  loose  from  the  party  alto- 
gether. Hence  he  enjoyed  the  distinction,  in 
the  year  1856,  of  being  indicted  by  a  grand 
jury  in  Virginia  for  circulating  therein,  a  news- 
paper, "  the  object  and  purpose  of  which  was 
to  advise  and  incite  negroes  in  this  State  to 
rebel  and  make  insurrection,  and  to  inculcate 
resistance  to  the  rights  of  property  of  masters 
in  their  slaves  in  the  State  of  Virginia."  The 
indictment  was  specifically  based  upon  an  ac- 
count of  a  negro  hunt,  quoted  from  the  Pitts- 
burgh DespatcJi.  The  Tribune  s  reply  was  to 
make  merry  with  the  nondescript  and  disrep- 
utable characters  who  were  supposed  to  have 
incited  and  carried  through  the  indictment. 

At  another  time  (1854)  a  man  of  Mississippi 
wrote  to  the  "  Hon.  Horace  Greeley"  a  letter, 
offering  to  sell  a  bright  mulatto  girl,  intelli- 
gent and  beautiful,  aged  between  twenty-eight 
and  thirty,  at  the  exceedingly  low  and  accom- 
modating price  of  one  thousand  dollars,  though 
she  would  easily  bring  sixteen  hundred  dollars, 
— for  he  was  willing  to  lose,  in  order  that  she 
might  "obtain  her  freedom."  She  was  the 
daughter  of  a  Judge  Hopkins,  to  pay  whose 
debts  she  had  been  sold  at  seven  years  of 
age.  She  was  well  educated,  and  spoke  French 
and  German   almost   to   perfection,   and   was 


164  HORACE  GREELEY. 

the  best  cook  and  seamstress  in  the  county. 
"  Callierine  is  honest  ;  and  for  the  ten  years 
that  I  have  owned  her  I  never  struck  her  a 
Hck,  about  her  work  or  anything  else."  In 
replying,  Mr.  Greeley  took  pains  to  disregard 
the  man's  request  of  anonymity  by  printing  his 
name  in  full,  that  request  seeming  to  him  "  in- 
spired by  a  modesty  and  self-sacrifice  unsuited 
to  the  Age  of  Brass  we  live  in."  After  much 
of  sarcasm  that  must  have  been  exceedingly 
scorching  even  to  the  callous  hide  of  his  cor- 
respondent, and  an  earnest  and  ingenious  effort 
to  make  the  fellow  realize  in  some  measure  the 
absurdity,  inconsistency,  and  meanness  of  his 
hypocritical  presentation  of  the  case,  he  in- 
forms him  that  he  is  mistaken  in  supposing 
that  "  the  friends  of  Liberty  in  this  quarter 
will  fight  her  battles  either  with  lead  or  steel, 
much  less  with  gold."  "  Their  trust,"  he 
concludes,  "  is  in  the  might  of  opinion  ;  in  the 
resistless  power  of  truth,  where  discussion  is 
untrammelled,  and  commercial  intercourse  con- 
stant ;  in  the  growing  humanity  of  our  age  ; 
in  the  deepening  sense  of  common  brother- 
hood ;  in  the  swelling  hiss  of  Christendom  and 
the  just  benignity  of  God.  In  the  earnest  faith 
that  these  must  soon  eradicate  a  wrong  so  gi- 
gantic and  so  palpable  as  Christian  slavery,  they 
serenely  await  the  auspicious  hour  v/hich  must 
surely  come." 


THE   REFORMER.  165 

One  of  Horace  Greeley's  most  characteristic 
acts,  for  its  superiority  to  mere  applause  or 
present  popularity,  and  its  almost  sublime  au- 
dacity and  frankness,  and  withal  his  incapacity 
to  approach  any  subject  except  from  its  most 
immediate  and  practical  aspect,  was  the  brief 
fifteen-minute  address  he  made  at  Exeter  Hall, 
London,  at  the  anniversary  of  the  British  and 
Foreign  Anti-Slavery  Society,  the  question 
under  discussion  being  :  "  What  can  we  Brit- 
ons do  to  hasten  the  overthrow  of  slavery  ?" 
His  whole  address  was  designed  to  enforce 
upon  their  minds  that  the  first  and  best  thing 
for  English  Abolitionists  to  do  to  hasten  the 
overthrow  of  slavery  elsewhere,  was  to  emanci- 
pate workingmen  from  their  ill-paid  and  social- 
ly depressed  condition  at  home  ;  for  English- 
men to  learn  respect  for  man  as  man,  without 
regard  to  class  or  calling  ;  to  do  away  with 
those  social  evils  and  degradation  of  manual 
workers,  particularly  in  England,  which  are  re- 
lied on  by  American  slaveholders  to  justify  the 
continuance  of  slavery  ;  and  finally  to  colonize 
our  slave  States  by  a  class  of  intelligent,  indus- 
trious, and  virtuous  laborers  who  should  de- 
monstrate that  they  can  be  cultivated  and  their 
great  staples  produced,  otherwise  than  by  the 
toil  of  slaves.  Exeter  Hall  took  its  dose  of 
wholesome  counsel  in  silence,  but  evidently 
with  no  enthusiastic  relish. 


CHAPTER   XL 

THE   REFORMER  (continued^. 

Horace  Greeley  was  brought  up  in  a  day 
and  a  community  where  the  universal  and  free 
drinking  of  hard  cider,  peach  brandy,  and  New- 
England  rum  was  not  only  a  matter  of  course, 
but  regarded  as  a  matter  of  necessity.  None 
of  the  labors  or  the  festivities  of  life  could  be 
carried  on  without  it.  Alike  in  seed-time  and 
harvest,  haying  and  wood-chopping,  cold  and 
heat,  "  raisings"  and  dancings,  militia  trainings, 
elections,  and  ministerial  ordinations,  weddings 
and  christenings  and  funerals,  in  the  transac- 
tion of  business  and  the  proffer  of  hospitality, 
and  even  in  the  regular  home-life  of  families, 
the  jug  was  kept  in  lively  circulation.  "  In 
many  a  family  of  six  or  eight  persons,"  he 
says,  "  a  barrel  tapped  on  Saturday  barely 
lasted  a  full  week.  ...  So  that  whole  fam- 
ilies died  drunkards  and  vagabond  paupers  from 
the  impetus  first  given  by  cider-swilling  in  their 
rural  homes."  Men's  eyes  were  yet  to  be 
opened  to  the  deluge  of  degradation,  bank- 
ruptcy, and  wretchedness  they  were  letting  in 
upon  themselves,  their  homes  and  communities. 


THE    REFORMER.  167 

Horace's  own  father,  it  is  understood,  owed  his 
financial  ill-successes  largely  to  this  leakage. 

The  boy  himself  never  fell  into  this  indul- 
gence, and  as  early  as  January  ist,  1824,  adopt- 
ed total  abstinence  as  the  result  solely  of  his  own 
observation  and  conclusions.  He  had  heard  of 
persons  who  had  made  a  kindred  resolve,  but 
had  not  known  one.  The  American  Temper- 
ance Society  was  yet  unknown,  and  did  not 
adopt  the  principle  of  total  abstinence  till  1833. 
His  resolve  was  a  private  one,  but  as  it  became 
known  it  excited  curiosity,  and  even  a  stronger 
feeling.  At  the  next  sheep-washing  he  was 
formally  condemned,  and,  on  his  declining  to 
take  a  glass  of  liquor,  he  was  held  by  two  or 
three  of  the  older  and  stronger  boys  while  the 
liquor  was  forced  into  his  mouth,  and  some  of 
it  down  his  throat.  This  attempt  to  put  an 
end  to  his  "  foolish  singularity"  was  a  total 
failure,  and,  soon  after  his  removal  to  Poult- 
ney,  he  took  part  in  organizing  the  first  local 
temperance  society.  He  was  thenceforth,  to 
the  end  of  his  life,  earnest  and  unremitting  in 
his  advocacy  of  this  cause,  but  he  never  was  in 
the  least  fanatical  on  the  subject,  especially  in 
the  direction  of  political  action  and  legal  re- 
straint. When  such  laws  were  made,  he  did 
his  best  for  their  enforcem.ent  ;  but  he  depre- 
cated the  premature  enactment  of  "  Maine 
Laws"  where  a  determined  public  sentiment 


l68  HORACE   GREELEY. 

could  not  be  depended  on  for  their  enforce- 
ment. .  The  friends  of  temperance,  he  said, 
must  not  consider  what  they  desire  to  see  ac- 
complished, but  what  majh^donc, — they  must 
look  at  things  as  they  are  (the  italics  are  his). 
The  only  available  provision  bearing  on  much 
of  the  traffic,  which  could  be  urged  with  any 
prospect  of  success,  was  "  the  imposition  of  a 
real  license-tax  (say  from  one  hundred  to  one 
thousand  dollars  per  annum),  Avhich  would  have 
the  effect  of  diminishing  the  evil  by  rendering 
less  frequent  and  less  universal  the  temptations 
which  lead  to  it. " 

We  add  an  interesting  extract  from  a  letter, 
written  August  I2th,  1855,  to  Sarah  Pellet, 
who  seems  to  have  urged  him  to  induce  Henry 
Ward  Beecher  to  come  out  to  California  and 
speak  for  the  temperance  cause.  He  writes  : 
"  I  will  try  to  see  him  after  his  return  to  town, 
but  I  have  no  hope  of  persuading  him  to  go  to 
California.  Indeed,  I  can  but  feebly  urge  it,  if 
at  all.  I  doubt  whether  he  is  more  needed  any- 
where else  than  in  this  Babel,  where  we  have 
yet  to  make  desperate  efforts  to  procure  some 
sort  of  respect  for  the  liquor  law.  It  is  doing 
good  through  nearly  all  the  rural  districts,  but 
the  cities  generally  defy  it,  with  the  help 
of  the  judges  and  lawyers.  We  must  try  it 
again.  And  we  haven't  a  single  Beecher  to 
spare  in  the  contest.     He  might  make  a  tem- 


THE    REFORMER.  1 69 

porary  sensation  in  California,  but  the  waters 
would  close  in  behind  him.  I  have  little  faith 
in  cometary  influences.  .  .  .  For  my  own 
part,  I  dislike  public  speaking,  and  am  trying 
to  avoid  it  for  the  future  ;  but  I  am  glad  to 
know  that  others  do  better  in  it.  We  are  to 
have  John  B.  Gough  back  from  England  next 
week.  If  he  could  be  allured  to  California,  he 
would  do  more  good  there  than  even  Beecher, 
I  suspect." 

It  was  in  accordance  with  his  own  tempera- 
ment and  with  the  spirit  of  the  time  that  Mr. 
Greeley  should  take  a  deep  interest  in  the 
movement,  which  reached  its  height  about 
forty  years  ago,  to  abolish  capital  punishment. 
His  tender-heartedness,  combined  with  his 
ruthless  habit  of  applying  to  all  things  the  test- 
question  '*  Cui  bofio  ?**  led  him,  as  early  as 
1836,  to  take  the  ground  that  the  punishment 
of  death  is  one  which  should  be  "  resorted  to 
as  unfrequently  as  possible.  Nothing,  in  our 
view,  but  cold-blooded,  premeditated,  unpalli- 
ated  murder  can  fully  justify  it."  Within  a 
few  years,  however,  he  was  at  the  front  of  the 
agitation  to  abolish  the  death  penalty  alto- 
gether, both  with  the  pen  and  on  the  platform. 
The  reform  seemed  to  be  going  swimmingly 
forward,  until  the  wholesale  application  of 
capital  punishment  to  the  Rebellion  rendered 
the  movement  a  painfully  ludicrous   anachro- 


170  HORACE   GREELEY. 

nism.  Mr.  Greeley  himself  felt  constrained  to 
drop  the  subject,  and  never  to  revive  it  except 
in  a  very  general  and  passing  way.  In  a  lec- 
ture published  under  his  sanction  as  late  as 
1868,  speaking  of  "  the  efforts,  but  yesterday 
so  earnest  and  active,  now  so  languid  and  un- 
apparent,"  he  says  :  "  Perhaps  this  effort  has 
already  succeeded  so  far  as  it  was  best  it  should 
succeed  at  present, — that  is,  so  far  that  some 
States  in  the  West,  as  others  in  the  East,  have 
absolutely,  and  others  virtually,  abolished  the 
death  penalty.  If  we  could  now  forget  the 
whole  subject  for  ten  years,  we  might,  at  the 
close  of  that  period,  compare  carefully  and 
searchingly  the  prevalence  of  crime  in  the 
States  respectively,  which  have  abolished  and 
those  which  have  retained  the  gallows,  and 
strike  an  instructive  balance  between  them. 
For  the  present,  let  it  suffice  that  no  one  ap- 
pears now  to  be  seriously  contending  that  life 
is  less  safe  or  crime  more  prevalent  in  the  States 
which  destroy  no  lives,  than  in  others.  I  rejoice 
in  the  hope  that  the  progress  of  Christianity, 
civilization,  and  liberty,  will  yet  drive  the  gal- 
lows altogether  from  the  earth." 

It  is  doubtless  to  the  same  shrinking  from 
the  infliction  of  suffering,  that  his  decided  at- 
titude and  pronounced  views  in  opposition  to 
war  are  due.  He  antagonized  an  appeal  to 
arms  in  every  instance  during  his  public  career  : 


THE    REFORxMER.  I /I 

the  "  Fifty-four-forty  or  Fight"  craze,  which 
came  so  near  involving  us  in  a  war  with  Eng- 
land on  the  Oregon  boundary  in  1842  ;  the 
Mexican  War  ;  and  even  (as  we  shall  see)  the 
coercion  of  the  seceding  States  in  1861.  Yet 
so  far  from  being  an  extremist  on  this  subject 
was  he,  that  if  he  had  been  a  delegate  to  the 
great  Peace  Convention  in  London  in  185 1, 
whose  sessions  he  attended  with  interest,  he 
tells  us  that  he  would  have  felt  it  his  duty  to 
throw  a  bomb  into  their  midst  by  a  resolution 
affirming  the  right  of  a  nation,  wantonly  in- 
vaded or  intolerably  oppressed,  to  resist  force 
by  force. 

The  Tribmie  under  Mr.  Greeley  was  an  early 
and  constant  advocate  of  the  movement  to  re- 
move the  political,  industrial,  and  social  dis- 
abilities of  woman,  and  was  recognized  as  a 
valuable  and  reliable  ally  by  the  Convention  at 
Worcester  in  1869,  under  the  leadership  of 
Mrs.  Julia  Ward  Howe. 

While  on  the  subject  of  political  reforms,  it 
is  worth  while  to  record  a  sentence  to  indicate 
Mr.  Greeley's  view  of  the  reform  of  politics  it- 
self. As  early  as  1848,  long  before  Mr.  Jenks, 
of  Rhode  Island,  had  begun  his  agitation  for 
civil  service  reform  in  Congress,  Horace  Gree- 
ley, at  a  Whig  meeting  in  New  York,  ex- 
pressed his  trust  "  that  the  day  is  not  distant 
when  an  amendment  of  the  Federal  Constitu- 


f72  HORACE    GREELEY. 

tion  will  give  the  appointment  of  postmasters 
and  other  local  officers  to  the  people,  and  strip 
the  President  of  the  enormous  and  anti-repub- 
lican patronage  vv^hich  now  causes  the  whole 
political  action  of  the  country  to  hinge  upon 
its  Presidential  elections."  In  nothing  did  he 
glory  more  in  his  great  political  idol  than  to  be 
able  to  quote  Elisha  Whittlesey's  saying  at 
the  close  of  his  long  service  as  Comptroller  of 
the  Treasury:  "Even  Mr.  Calhoun  has  in- 
creased his  charge  of  mileage  since  the  old 
horseback  and  stage-coach  days  ;  and  there  is 
just  one  man  in  Congress  who  charges  mileage 
now  as  all  did  then  ;  that  man  is  Henrv 
Clay"  (the  capitals  are  his  own). 

In  accordance  with  his  own  views  of  the  Re- 
former (already  quoted  briefly),  he  began  at 
home, — that  is,  to  reform  himself  in  the  matter 
of  his  food.  Under  the  influence  of  Sylvester 
Graham,  in  1831-32,  he  adopted  the  dietary 
system  taught  by  that  gentleman,  and  became 
an  inmate  of  the  boarding-house  which  the 
**  Doctor"  established  for  its  practical  exem- 
plification. He  himself,  however,  never  wholly 
rejected  the  use  of  meat  or  tea.  But  he  always 
contended  that  "  a  diet  made  up  of  sound  grain 
(ground,  but  unbolted),  ripe,  undecayed  fruits, 
and  a  variety  of  fresh  wholesome  vegetables, 
with  milk,  butter,  and  cheese,  and  very  little 
of  spices  or  condiments,  will  enable  our  grand- 


THE    REFORMER.  1 73 

children  to  live,  in  the  average,  far  longer,  and 
fall  far  less  frequently  into  the  hands  of  the 
doctors,  than  we  do.  .  .  :  Other  things  being 
equal,  I  judge  that  a  strict  vegetarian  will  live 
ten  years  longer  than  a  habitual  flesh-eater, 
while  suffering,  in  the  average,  less  than  half  so 
much  from  sickness  as  the  carnivorous  must.'* 
He  was  by  no  means  optimistic  of  dietetic  re- 
forms, but  was  convinced,  by  the  observation 
and  experience  of  a  third  of  a  century,  that  all 
public  danger  lay  in  the  direction  opposite  to 
that  of  vegetarianism,  and  "  that  a  thousand 
fresh  Grahams  let  loose  each  year  upon  the 
public,  will  not  prevent  the  consumption,  in  the 
average,  of  far  too  much  and  too  highly  sea- 
soned animal  food  ;  while  all  the  Goughs  and 
Neal  Dows  that  ever  were,  or  can  be  scared 
up,  will  not  deter  the  body  politic  from  pour- 
ing down  its  throat  a  great  deal  more  *  fire- 
water '  than  is  good  for  it." 

Mr.  Greeley's  name  has  been  unduly  and 
incorrectly  identified  with  the  earlier  phenom- 
ena of  so-called  Spiritualism.  In  1845,  i"  Pur- 
suance of  his  policy  of  free  speech  in  the 
Tribune,  he  added  a  full  exposition  of  Andrew 
Jackson  Davis's  "  Revelations,"  but  without 
any  expression  of  opinion  concerning  them  as 
of  supernatural  origin.  In  the  spring  of  1848 
the  "  Rochester  rappings"  made  their  appear- 
ance, but  attracted  no  particular  attention  from 


174  HORACE    GREELEY. 

him  until  two  or  three  years  after  when  the  Fox 
sisters  visited  his  wife,  who  was  then  specially 
interested  in  things  pertaining  to  the  unseen 
world  on  account  of  the  recent  death  of  her 
child.  Among  those  who  were  present  at  the 
*'  seances'  at  his  house  were  Jenny  Lind,  and 
N.  P.  Willis,  who  wrote  some  papers  on  the 
subject  in  the  Home  Joiiriial.  In  his  "  Recol- 
lections" he  relates  some  "  manifestations"  at 
the  time,  which  puzzled  but  by  no  means  con- 
vinced or  converted  him.  "  Not  long  after- 
ward," he  says,  "  I  witnessed  what  I  strongly 
suspected  to  be  a  juggle  or  trick  on  the  part  of 
a  *  medium,'  which  gave  me  a  disrelish  for  the 
whole  business,  and  I  have  seen  very  little  of 
it  since."  Among  the  seven  heads,  under 
which  he  formally  sums  up  his  reasons  for  not 
devoting  his  time  to  further  "  investigation," 
was  this  :  that,  on  the  whole,  it  seemed  to  him 
that  the  great  body  of  the  Spiritualists  had  not 
been  rendered  "  better  men  and  women — bet- 
ter husbands,  wives,  parents,  and  children — by 
their  new  faith.  ...  I  judge  that laxer  notions 
respecting  marriage,  divorce,  chastity,  and 
stern  morality  generally,  have  advanced  in  the 
wake  of  Spiritualism." 

This  leads  us  to  notice  Mr.  Greeley's  pecul- 
iarly strong  and  conservative  stand  upon  the 
questions  of  Marriage  and  Divorce, — and  we  do 
so  especially  because   there  still  lingers  an  ig- 


THE    REFORMER.  1 75 

norant,  if  not  wilful,  misunderstanding  of  him 
on  this  matter,  arising  probably  out  of  the 
general  carelessness  to  distinguish  the  associa- 
tive principle  in  itself  from  anarchic  and  licen- 
tious theories  of  Communism.  His  views  are 
very  distinctly  and  characteristically  stated  in 
a  discussion  which  he  held  in  the  Tribune,  in 
the  year  i860,  with  Robert  Dale  Owen,  of  In- 
diana. He  argues  for  the  indissolubility  of  the 
marriage  compact,  except  on  the  single  ground 
admitted  by  Jesus  of  Nazareth,  whom  he 
bluntly  tells  Mr.  Owen,  "  I  must  consider  a 
better  authority  as  to  what  is  '  Christian  *  and 
what  'pleases  God'  than  you  are."  He  de- 
fines marriage,  according  to  Webster  and 
Worcester  and  the  marriage  service,  as  "  for 
life"  and  "  till  death  shall  separate  them,"  and 
demands  that  those  who  think  they  have  found 
a  better  substitute  should  *'  give  their  bantling 
a  distinctive  name,  and  not  appropriate  ours. 
They  have  been  often  enough  warned  off  our 
premises  ;  shall  we  never  be  able  to  shame 
them  out  of  their  unwarrantable  poaching?" 

Again  :  "  Marriage  is  a  matter  which  concerns 
not  only  the  men  and  women  who  contract  it, 
but  the  State,  the  community,  mankind.  .  .  . 
No  couple  can  innocently  take  upon  them- 
selves the  obligations  of  marriage  until  they 
KNOW  that  they  are  one  in  spirit,  and  so  must 
remain    forever.     If   they   rashly  lay  profane 


176  HORACE    GREELEY. 

hands  on  the  ark,  theirs  alone  is  the  blame  ; 
be  theirs  alone  the  penalty.  They  have  no 
right  to  cast  it  on  that  public  which  admon- 
ished and  entreated  them  to  forbear,  and  ad- 
monished and  entreated  in  vain." 

We  give  only  one  more  racy  extract,  chiefly 
because  it  gives  the  consistent  link  between  Mr. 
Greeley's  position  on  this  question  of  marriage 
and  that  which  he  held  on  Socialism,  to  which 
we  are  next  to  advert  :  "  The  vice  of  our  age, 
the  main  source  of  its  aberrations,  is  a  morbid 
egotism  which  overrides  the  gravest  social 
necessities  in  its  mad  pursuit  of  individual, 
personal  ends.  Your  fling  at  that  '  intangible 
generality  called  Society  '  is  directly  in  point. 
You  are  concerned  chiefly  for  those  who,  hav- 
ing married  unfortunately,  if  not  viciously,  seek 
relief  from  their  bonds.  I  am  anxious  rather 
to  prevent  or,  at  least,  to  render  infrequent"  — 
such  mistakes  hereafter.  "  '  It  is  very  hard,' 
said  a  culprit  to  the  judge  who  sentenced  him, 

*  that  I  should  be  so  severely  punished  for  mere- 
ly stealing  a  horse.'      '  Man,'  replied  the  judge, 

*  you  are  not  so  punished  for  merely  stealing 
a  horse,  but  tJiat  horses  may  not  be  stolen. '  The 
distinction  seems  to  me  vital  and  just." 

Besides  his  vegetarianism,  Horace  Greeley 
had  really  r.o  **  isni'  except  that  particular 
form  of  socialistic  experiment  known  as  Fou- 


THE    REFORMER.  1 77 

rierlsm.  We  use  the  word  "  ism'*  in  the  sense 
of  a  personal  hobby,  or  an  ultra  and  outrd 
phase  of  specific  reform,  as  distinguished  from 
a  general  movement  enlisting  the  sympathy 
and  co-operation  of  inquiring  and  philanthrop- 
ic minds.  We  have  advanced,  and  are  ad- 
vancing every  day,  so  fast  along  the  line  of 
associative  living  and  labor,  that  it  would  be 
needless  to  defend  Mr.  Greeley,  or  to  deny  him 
due  credit  for  his  brave  and  unpopular  pioneer 
work  ;  and  our  only  concern  is  to  trace  his 
temporary  connection  with  a  special  theory, 
and  certain  experiments  with  which  his  name 
was  prominently  allied.  On  the  general  sub- 
ject we  simply  quote  his  own  words,  published 
in  thoughtful  retrospect  in  the  year  1868  :  "I 
believe  in  association,  or  co-operation,  or  what- 
ever name  may  be  given  to  the  combination  of 
many  heads  and  hands  to  achieve  a  beneficent 
result  which  is  beyond  the  means  of  one  or  a 
few  of  them, — for  I  perceive  that  vast  econo- 
mies and  vastly  increased  efficiency  may  be 
thus  secured  ;  I  reject  Communism  as  at  war 
with  one  of  the  strongest  and  most  universal 
instincts, — that  which  impels  each  worker  to 
produce  and  save  for  himself  and  his  own.  .  .  . 
That  *  many  hands  make  light  work,*  is  an  old 
discovery  ;  it  shall  yet  be  proved  that  the 
combined  efforts  of  many  workers  make  labor 
efficient  and  ennobling,  as  well  as  attractive. 


178  HORACE   GREELEY. 

In  modern  society,  all  things  tend  uncon- 
sciously toward  grand,  comprehensive,  pervad- 
ing- reforms.  The  steamboat,  the  railroad,  the 
omnibus,  are  but  blind  gropings  toward  an  end 
which,  unpremeditated,  shall  yet  be  attained  ; 
in  the  order  of  nature,  nothing  ultimately  re- 
sists an  economy  ;  and  the  skeptical,  sneering 
■vvorld  shall  yet  perceive  and  acknowledge  that 
in  many  important  relations,  and  not  merely 
in  one,  '  it  is  not  good  for  man  to  be  alone.' 
.  .  .  Religion  often  makes  practicable  that 
which  were  else  impracticable,  and  divine  love 
triumphs  where  human  science  is  baffled. 
Thus  I  interpret  the  past  successes  and  failures 
of  Socialism." 

Mr.  Greeley's  thoughts  and  observations 
during  the  winter  of  1837-8  (perhaps  marked 
by  the  greatest  destitution,  dearth  of  employ- 
ment, and  paralysis  of  business,  which  our 
country  has  ever  seen)  impelled  him  to  write 
for  the  Nezv  Yorker  a  series  of  articles  entitled, 
* '  What  Shall  be  Done  for  the  Laborer  ?"  About 
the  time  when  these  appeared  two  years  later, 
a  Mr.  Albert  Brisbane,  of  Batavia,  N.  Y.,  a 
young  gentleman  of  varied  culture  and  exten- 
sive travel,  who  had  made  a  special  study  of 
the  socialistic  schools  of  Europe,  and  whose 
attention  had  been  attracted  by  the  articles, 
published  an  exposition  and  commendation  of 
Charles  Fourier's  industrial  system.     That  sys- 


THE    REFORMER.  1 79 

tern,  as  distinguished  from  the  competing 
schemes  of  St.  Simon  and  Robert  Owen,  is 
thus  epitomized  by  Mr.  Greeley:  "Society, 
as  we  find  it,  is  organized  rapacity"  (this  ex- 
pression must  not  be  confounded  with  Prud- 
hon's  maxim  that  **  property  is  robbery"). 
"  Half  of  its  force  is  expended  in  repressing  or 
resisting  the  jealousies  or  rogueries  of  its  mem- 
bers. We  need  universal  justice,  based  on 
science.  The  true  Eden  lies  before,  not  be- 
hind us.  We  may  so  provide  that  labor,  now 
repulsive,  may  be  attractive  ;  while  its  effi- 
ciency in  production  shall  be  increased  by  im- 
provement in  machinery  and  the  extended  use 
of  natural  forces,  so  as  to  secure  abundance, 
education,  and  elegant  luxury  to  all.  What  is 
needed  is  to  provide  all  with  homes,  employ- 
ment, instruction,  good  living,  the  most  effec- 
tive implements,  machinery,  etc.,  securing 
to  each  the  fair  and  full  recompense  of  his 
achievement.  And  this  can  be  best  attained 
through  the  association  of  some  four  to  five 
hundred  families  in  a  common  household,  and 
in  the  ownership  and  cultivation  of  a  common 
domain,  say  of  two  thousand  acres,  or  about 
one  acre  to  each  person  living  thereon." 

While  preferring  this  system  as  the  most 
suggestive  and  practical,  "  though  in  many  re- 
spects erratic,  mistaken,  and  visionary,"  Mr. 
Greeley  explicitly  declared  his  independence  of 


l8o  HORACE   GREELEY. 

all  "  masters"  or  methods.  He  found  "  many 
of  his  speculations  fantastic,  erroneous,  and 
(in  my  view)  pernicious."  His  own  "  social 
creed"  is  given  in  full  in  his  *'  Recollections 
of  a  Busy  Life,"  and  may  be  thus  briefly  out- 
lined :  "  There  need  be  and  should  be  no 
paupers  who  are  not  infantile,  idiotic,  or 
disabled  ;  and  civilized  society  pays  more  for 
the  support  of  able-bodied  pauperism  than  the 
necessary  cost  of  its  extirpation."  "  They  bab- 
ble idly  and  libel  Providence  who  talk  of  sur- 
plus labor,  or  the  inadequacy  of  capital  to  sup- 
ply employment  to  all  who  need  it."  Through 
what  he  calls  "  social  anarchy,"  bad  manage- 
ment, and  waste  of  energy,  "  it  is  quite  within 
the  truth  to  estimate  the  annual  product  of  our 
national  industry  at  less  than  one  half  of  what 
it  might  be  if  better  applied  and  directed  ;" 
*'  inefficiency  in  production  is  paralleled  by 
waste  in  consumption.  .  .  .  I  judge  that  the 
cooks  of  Paris  would  subsist  one  million  per- 
sons on  the  food  consumed  or  wasted  by  six 
hundred  thousand  in  this  city,  feeding  them 
better  than  they  are  now  fed,  and  prolonging 
their  lives  by  an  average  of  five  years." 
"  Every  child  should  be  trained  to  skill  and 
efficiency  in  productive  labor,  and  the  hours 
of  children  should  be  alternately  devoted  to 
labor,  study,  and  recreation — say  two  hours  to 
each  before,  and  a  like  allotment  after,  dinner, 


THE   REFORMER.  l8l 

each  secular  day  ;"  .  .  .  not  till  one  has 
achieved  the  fullest  command,  the  most  varied 
use  of  all  his  faculties  and  powers,  can  he  be 
properly  said  to  be  educated  ;"  "  isolation  is  at 
war  with  efficiency  and  with  progress,  and  the 
poor  work  at  perpetual  disadvantage  in  isola- 
tion." Under  the  association  principle  (four 
or  five  hundred  heads  of  families  combining  to 
embark  in  agriculture  on  a  common  domain), 
"one  fourth,  at  most,  of  the  land  required 
under  the  old  system  would  be  found  abun- 
dant ;  it  could  be  far  better  allotted  to  grain, 
grass,  fruits,  forest,  garden,  etc.;  the  draught 
animals,  that  were  far  too  few  when  dispersed 
among  five  hundred  owners  on  so  many  differ- 
ent farms,  would  be  amply  sufficient  for  a  com- 
mon domain  ;  steam  and  water  power  could 
now  be  economically  employed  for  a  hundred 
purposes  (cutting  and  sawing  timber,  threshing 
and  grinding  grain,  ploughing  the  soil,  and  for 
many  household  uses)  where  the  small  farmer 
could  not  think  of  employing  it."  And  lastly, 
new  incentives  to  industry  and  a  new  zest  to 
life  would  be  imparted  by  the  esprit  de  corps 
of  a  unified  community,  and  by  the  means  of 
recreation  which  it  could  provide  which  are 
now  out  of  the  reach  of  rural  workers. 

These  views  were  occasionally  presented  by 
Mr.  Greeley  in  the  Tribune^  beginning  about  a 
year  after  its  start  ;    and  its  columns  were  also 


I  82  HORACE   GREELEV. 

used  for  several  years,  by  permission  or  by 
purchase,  by  Mr.  Brisbane  and  others  for  the 
statement  and  discussion  of  their  ideas.  Few 
converts  were  gained  and  many  antagonists 
aroused,  but  several  experiments  were  made 
"  to  realize  our  social  Utopia,"  as  he  calls  it. 
The  first  and  only  attempt  in  New  England 
was  the  famous  one  known  as  "  Brook  Farm," 
in  Roxbury,  near  Boston.  The  subsequent 
fame  of  some  of  its  founders  and  helpers — such 
as  George  Ripley,  Nathaniel  Hawthorne, 
Charles  A.  Dana,  John  S.  Dwight,  \V.  H. 
Channing,  IMargaret  Fuller,  O.  A.  Brownson, 
C.  P.  Cranch,  Parke  Godwin,  George  \Vm. 
Curtis,  Theodore  Parker,  and  Greeley  himself, 
— have  given  it  a  sort  of  classic  immortality  ; 
but  it  was  a  pecuniary  failure,  being  disbanded 
after  a  trial  of  six  years  (i 841-7),  barely  pay- 
ing its  debts. 

The  "  North  American  Phalanx"  was  the 
experiment  with  which  Horace  Greeley  was 
more  immediately  connected.  It  was  organ- 
ized in  1843,  ^^^^  ^  farm  of  six  hundred  and 
seventy-three  acres  near  Red  Bank,  N.  J., 
with  a  capital  of  one  hundred  thousand  dol- 
lars subscribed  and  loaned  by  its  members. 
It  did  not  succeed,  but  was  not  bankrupt  on 
its  closing  up  in  i8$o,  each  stockholder  receiv- 
ing about  sixty-five  per  cent  on  his  investment 
with   interest,    after    payment    of   the    debts. 


THE    REFORMER.  183 

This  was  the  last  attempt  to  carry  Fourierism 
into  practical  operation.  Mr.  Greeley  frankly 
admits  that  if  this  enterprise  could  not  live, 
there  was  no  hope  for  any  other. 

Another  curious  admission  was  that  the  seri- 
ous obstacle  of  any  socialist  experiment  lay  in 
the  kind  of  persons  who  are  naturally  attracted 
to  it.  *'  Along  with  many  noble  and  lofty 
souls  whose  impulses  are  purely  philanthropic, 
and  who  are  willing  to  labor  and  suffer  reproach 
for  any  cause  that  promises  to  benefit  man- 
kind, there  throng  scores  of  whom  the  world 
is  quite  worthy — the  conceited,  the  crotchety, 
the  selfish,  the  headstrong,  the  pugnacious,  the 
unappreciated,  the  played-out,  the  idle,  and 
the  good-for-nothing  generally,  who,  finding 
themselves  utterly  out  of  place  and  at  a  dis- 
count in  the  world  as  it  is,  rashly  conclude  that 
they  are  exactly  fitted  for  the  world  as  it  should 
be."  These  are  apt  to  clutch  with  self-con- 
fidence the  responsible  positions,  and  to  wreck 
what  might  have  succeeded  if  engineered  by  its 
best  members. 

It  was  on  this  very  point — the  inherent  weak- 
ness of  human  nature — that  Mr.  Henry  J.  Ray- 
mond most  pertinaciously  and  successfully 
pressed  Mr.  Greeley  in  the  great  discussion  of 
1846,  to  which  we  have  already  alluded  in  our 
account  of  the  Tribune,  "The  Tribufie's  did- 
mission,"  writes  Mr.  Raymond,  "  that  an  as- 


1 84  HORACE   GREELEY. 

sociation  of  indolent  or  covetous  persons  could 
not  endure  without  a  moral  transformation  of 
its  members,  seems  to  us  fatal  to  the  whole 
theory  of  association.  It  implies  that  indi- 
vidual reform  must  precede  social  reform,  which 
is  precisely  our  position.  But  how  is  individual 
reform  to  be  effected  ?  By  association,  says  the 
Tribune.  That  is,  the  motion  of  the  water- 
wheel  is  to  produce  the  water  by  which  alone 
it  can  be  set  in  motion  ;  the  action  of  the  watch 
is  to  produce  the  mainspring  without  which  it 
cannot  move." 

Altogether,  this  brilliant  and  powerful  on- 
slaught, coming  on  the  heels  of  admitted  fail- 
ure, and  aimed  at  admitted  and  essential  weak- 
nesses, served  as  a  coup  de  grace  to  Fourierism, 
and  Mr.  Greeley's  allusions  to  the  subject  were 
henceforth  few  and  far  between.  According  to 
Mr.  Thurlow  Weed,  "  Mr.  Greeley's  delusion 
cost  him  dearly  in  many  ways.  For  a  season 
it  lessened  the  circulation  and  influence  of  his 
paper,  and  impaired  public  confidence  in  his 
judgment  ;  while  the  time,  labor,  and  money 
given  to  *  phalanxes  '  and  *  Brook  Farms  '  re- 
sulted in  personal  mortification  and  pecuniary 
loss."  He  differed  from  Mr.  Weed  as  to  its 
political  bearings,  believing  that  a  chief  source 
of  weakness  to  the  Whig  Party  had  been  its 
repelling,  by  its  "  silk-stocking"  and  gold- 
handled-cane  conservatism,  "  all  the  devotees 


THE    REFORMER.  185 

of  social  reform  of  any  kind,  all  the  advocates 
of  a  higher  destiny  for  labor,  all  the  combatants 
against  unjust  and  false  social  principles — in 
short,  all  the  social  discontent  of  the  country," 
which  thus  formed  "a  heavy  dead-weight" 
against  it. 


CHAPTER    XII. 


THE   POLITICIAN  :    AS   A   WHIG. 


Horace  Greeley  had  a  "  natural  bent" 
for  politics,  just  as  Paul  Morphy  had  for  chess, 
or  Paul  du  Chaillu  for  lion-hunting.  It  was  to 
him  more  than  "  a  game,"  as  it  is  sometimes 
called  ;  it  had  all  the  reality  of  war.  He  was 
profoundly  interested  in  the  massing  and  de- 
ploying, and  the  collision  of  men  in  civic  strife. 
He  had  the  stern  joy  of  battle  in  political  con- 
tests and  **  campaigns,"  in  strategy  and  tactics, 
in  leaders,  defeats  and  victories,  as  Lord 
VVolseley  in  the  science  and  movements  of  war. 
He  records  himself  as  having  been  an  ardent 
politician  when  he  was  "  not  yet  half  old 
enough  to  vote."  Nor  was  this  a  mere  parti- 
san sentiment,  but  an  intelligent  study.  A 
contemporary  of  his  earliest  apprenticeship 
testifies  to  his  already  having  learned  to  observe 
and  remember  political  statistics,  the  leading 
men  and  measures  of  parties,  the  multitudinous 
candidates  for  State,  Congressional,  and  district 
offices  all  over  the  country.  He  was  all  this 
in  the  log-cabin  of  his  father,  as  he  huddled 
himself  up  in  the  chimney-corner  to  read  by  his 


THE    POLITICIAN.  1 8/ 

pine  knot,  or  as  he  lay  in  ambush  for  the  local 
paper  to  have  the  first  reading. 

His  first  distinct  consciousness  of  being  in  a 
campaign  was  the  Presidential  election  of  1824, 
in  which,  among  the  four  Republican  or  Dem- 
ocratic candidates  (those  names,  since  so  antag- 
onistic, meant  the  same  thing  then),  he  gave 
his  entire  sympathies  to  the  union  of  the  sup- 
porters of  John  Quincy  Adams  and  of  Henry 
Clay,  to  defeat,  first,  the  caucus  candidate,  Mr. 
Crawford,  of  Georgia,  and,  secondly,  General 
Jackson.  In  fact,  he  here  may  be  said  to  have 
donned  his  politico-editorial  spurs,  for  among 
the  paragraphs  which  he  wrote  for  the  North- 
ern Spectator,  an  Adams  paper,  he  doubtless 
put  in  his  little  word  for  his  candidate.  By 
the  next  election,  in  1828,  the  latter  had  suc- 
ceeded in  getting  himself  "  hurrahed"  to  the 
front,  and  by  persistent  reiteration  had  impress- 
ed the  popular  mind  with  the  idea  that  the 
junction  of  Adams  and  Clay  had  been  a  corrupt 
cabal,  and  purchase  of  the  Presidency  at  the 
price  of  the  Secretaryship  of  State.  In  com- 
mon with  all  the  community  of  East  Poultney 
(which  cast  not  more  than  half  a  dozen  votes 
for  the  **  Hero  of  New  Orleans"),  Horace  was 
altogether  opposed  to  Jackson.  He  tells  us 
that  he  had  "  studied  pretty  thoroughly  and 
without  prejudice  the  character  of  this  man 
Jackson,"  his   bullying  and  brow-beating,  his 


1 88  HORACE   GREELEY. 

duels  and  horse-racings  and  street-fights,  his 
outrages  upon  martial  and  civil  law,  and  had 
convinced  himself  that  "  the  man  never  was  a 
Democrat  in  any  proper  sense  of  the  term,  but 
a  violent  and  lawless  despot  after  the  pattern 
of  Caesar,  Cromwell,  and  Napoleon,  and  unfit 
to  be  trusted  with  power," — an  opinion  which 
he  carried,  with  slight  mitigation,  throughout 
his  political  life.  In  fact,  we  find  that  a  large 
proportion  of  his  most  strenuous  and  charac- 
teristic opinions  were  formed  at  this  very  early 
age.  Even  in  1824,  though  living  over  the 
Vermont  line  in  a  rustic  and  secluded  commu- 
nity, he  acquired  an  unconquerable  repugnance 
to  what  was  known  as  the  Albany  Regency, 
which  had  endeavored  to  cram  Crawford  down 
the  Democratic  throat,  and  to  establish  the 
first  great  **  machine"  in  the  machine-ridden 
**  Empire"  State. 

Nevertheless,  Horace  did  not  continue  his 
direct  support  to  Adams  or  Clay  in  1832,  but 
was  swept  aside  by  the  Anti-Mason  excitement 
to  the  support  of  William  Wirt,  who,  next  to 
Henry  Clay,  was  the  political  leader  who  most 
won  his  heart  throughout  all  his  life.  It  was 
very  characteristic  of  his  liberty-loving  spirit  to 
embark  upon  that  singular  crusade  against  what 
was  generally  believed  to  be  a  new  Jesuitry  or 
Venetian  council, — a  prejudice  which  extended 
to  all  secret  societies  to  the  day  of  his  death. 


THE   POLITICIAN.  1 89 

Whether  or  not  the  printer's  boy  had  much  to 
do  with  the  result,  certain  it  is  that  Vermont 
was  the  only  State  which  cast  its  vote  for  Mr. 
Wirt. 

This  brings  us  to  the  important  point  in 
Horace  Greeley's  life — his  coming  to  New 
York — which,  as  we  intimated  in  our  opening 
chapter,  was  at  the  threshold  of  a  new  era  in 
politics  as  in  many  other  things.  (He  arrived 
in  the  city  on  the  second  of  the  three  days' 
election.)  For  it  was  during  this  last  term  of 
Jackson  that  the  political  genius  of  Martin  Van 
Buren  created  the  present  Democratic  Party, 
and  evolved  the  economic  tenets  of  its  creed. 
Greeley  found  himself  already  in  antagonism 
to  these,  both  those  which  were  distinctly  de- 
clared and  those  which  were  latent  and  not  as 
yet  peculiar.  As  respects  the  former,  he  was, 
from  a  mere  youth  (and,  as  he  claims,  by  an 
impartial  study  of  both  sides,  most  of  the 
papers  he  saw  being  from  Boston),  a  Protec- 
tionist. **  We  Vermonters  wereall  Protection- 
ists," he  candidly  adds.  Poultney,  in  partic- 
ular, bravely  acquitted  itself  of  all  responsibility 
for  **  whatev^er  disaster  the  political  revolu- 
tion" in  this  direction  "might  involve,"  by 
giving  an  almost  unanimous  vote  against 
Jackson. 

Several  years  previous  to  this  time,  Horace 
Greeley  had  become  a  pronounced  advocate  of 


190  HORACE   GREELEY. 

paper  money,  from  the  reading  of  Dr.  Frank- 
lin's Autobiography.  But  he  wanted  it  "to 
be  money ^  convertible  at  pleasure  into  coin," 
and  hence  was  "  not  partial  to  local  emissions 
of  paper,"  but  a  zealous,  determined  advocate 
of  a  National  Bank,  and,  of  course,  an  ardent 
opponent  of  the  New  Democracy  in  "  the 
United  States  Bank  war  which  had  already 
been  inaugurated  by  General  Jackson's  im- 
perious will."  It  was  this  question  especially 
which  touched  New  York,  the  commercial 
heart  and  nerve  of  the  country,  to  the  quick  ; 
and  here  arose,  in  the  local  election  of  April, 
1834,  the  organized  opposition  which  (in  order 
to  indicate  their  uprisal  against  what  they  con- 
sidered unwarranted  encroachments  of  the 
Executive  power)  called  themselves  "  Whigs." 
It  was  not  long  afterward,  by  the  way,  that 
they  tried  to  fasten  the  name  "  Loco-foco'* 
upon  their  opponents,  on  account  of  an  odd  in- 
cident at  a  meeting  where  loco-foco  matches 
figured,  and  quite  successfully,  for  a  time.  At 
any  rate,  it  was  Horace  Greeley's  habit  to  call 
the  Democrats  "  Loco-focos"  long  after  its 
significance  had  died  away,  like  the  blaze  and 
stench  of  the  match  itself. 

Mr.  Greeley  pronounces  this  election  as  the 
most  vehement  and  keenly  contested  struggle 
which  he  ever  witnessed,  and  the  total  vote 
polled    as  probably  a  closer  approach   to    the 


THE   POLITICIAN.  I9I 

whole  number  of  legal  voters  than  was  ever 
drawn  out  before  or  since.  The  **  Jacksonites" 
elected  the  mayor,  but  the  Whigs  carried  both 
branches  of  the  Common  Council,  so  that  the 
result  was  generally  regarded  as  a  drawn  bat- 
tle. In  the  State  election,  in  the  fall,  how- 
ever, the  new  party  was  less  successful, — owing, 
in  Mr.  Greeley's  opinion,  to  the  "  factitious 
but  seductive  semblance  of  prosperity,  and  the 
inflation  which  preceded  the  impending  col- 
lapse." This  was  the  first  appearance  in  Fed- 
eral politics  of  William  H.  Seward,  then  thirty- 
four  years  old  and  a  distinguished  member  of 
the  State  Senate.  He  was  the  Whig  candidate 
for  Governor,  but  William  L.  Marcy  was  re- 
elected by  an  increased  majority  ;  and  the 
Whigs  fell  into  a  discouraged  state,  which  en- 
abled the  "  Fox  of  Lindenwald"  to  run  into 
the  White  House  under  the  folds  of  General 
Jackson's  cloak  in  1838.  The  candidate  of  the 
Whigs,  and  of  Mr.  Greeley,  was  General  Wil- 
liam Henry  Harrison  ;  but,  strange  to  say,  he 
aroused  at  that  time  so  little  enthusiasm  that, 
notwithstanding  an  independent  Jackson  nom- 
ination of  Hugh  L.  White  which  ran  with  great 
strength  in  the  South,  the  regular  Jacksonian 
ticket  was  triumphant.  It  never  ceased  to  be 
a  source  of  surprise  to  Horace  Greeley  that 
Martin  Van  Burenwas  elected.  He  could  dis- 
cover in  him  no  elements  of  power  or  personal 


192  HORACE   GREELEY. 

magnetism  which  should  make  him  a  success- 
ful leader,  and  believed  that  "  his  strength  lay 
in  his  suavity,"  his  adroitness  and  subtlety, 
combined  with  "  the  personal  favor  and  im- 
perious will  of  Andrew  Jackson,  with  whom 
'Love  me,  love  my  dog  *  was  an  iron  rule." 
Had  he  lived  to  read  Mr.  Edward  M.  Shep- 
ard's  "  Life  of  Martin  Van  Buren"  (in  the 
American  Statesman  Series),  he  might  have 
learned  that  it  was  the  political  brain  and 
creative  genius  of  the  "  Loco-foco"  party, 
which  was  fitly  selected  for  its  first  distinctively 
party  President.  Moreover,  Horace  Greeley 
was  long — too  long — in  learning  the  truth  that 
it  is  not  the  greatest  man,  but  just  the  most 
"  subtle  and  adroit,"  or  else  the  least  objec- 
tionable (or  "  most  available,"  which  is  often 
the  same  thing),  who  stands  the  best  chance 
to  become  what  was  predicted  of  himself  in  his 
boyhood — "President  of  the  United  States." 

When  the  time  came  for  the  Whig  nomina- 
tion of  1840,  Mr.  Greeley  seems  to  have  fallen 
with  strange  readiness  into  the  general  opinion 
that  his  favorite,  Henry  Clay,  could  not  be 
elected,  and  to  have  followed  the  lead  of  Gov- 
ernor Seward  and  Thurlow  Weed  in  urging  the 
renomination  of  General  Harrison.  The  truth 
has  long  since  been  demonstrated  that  Mr. 
Clay,  or  any  other  good  nominee,  could  have 
been  carried  in  on  the  political  reaction  caused 


THE   POLITICIAN.  I93 

by  the  commercial  collapse  of  1837.  But  the 
"expediency"  candidate  proved  to  be  the  mag- 
netic name.  The  country  had  waked  up  to  an 
enthusiasm  for  precisely  the  same  individual 
whom  it  had  looked  at  with  indifference  four 
years  ago, — an  enthusiasm,  which  has  never  been 
equalled  in  the  history  of  Presidential  elec- 
tions. Perhaps  it  would  be  more  correct  to 
say  that  it  was  not  the  same  nominee  in  both 
cases.  It  was  William  Henry  Harrison  who 
was  defeated  in  1837  ;  it  was  "  Tippecanoe" 
who  was  elected  in  1840.  The  platform  in  the 
former  case  was  Bank  and  Tariff  ;  in  the  latter 
it  was  Log-Cabin  and  Hard  Cider. 

It  was  while  the  **  political  earthquake"  was 
at  its  height,  that  Horace  Greeley  was  discov- 
ered by  the  Albany  Whig  regime,  and  set  to 
grinding  in  the  mills  of  campaign  journalism. 
His  Jeffersonian  was  the  standard  of  ' '  the  new 
era  in  politics"  during  the  year  1838,  when  an 
unprecedented  vote  was  brought  out  in  the 
fall  election,  and  Mr.  Seward  was  elected  Gov- 
ernor over  Marcy, — Mr.  Greeley  regarding  the 
result  as  an  evidence  of  the  efficiency  of  his 
efforts.  The  Log-Cabin^  which  was  his  con- 
tribution to  the  campaign  of  1840  (inaugurated 
nearly  a  year  before  the  date  of  election,  at 
the  first  Whig  National  Convention,  and  the 
second  national  convention  ever  held  by  any 
party),  was  the  very  key-note  and  bugle-call  of 


194  HORACE    GREELEY. 

that  extraordinary  political  "  tally-ho."  Says 
its  editor,  with  considerable  7iaivete' :  "  They 
had  campaign  and  other  papers,  good  speakers 
and  large  meetings  ;  but  we  were  far  ahead  of 
them  in  singing  and  in  electioneering  emblems 
and  mottoes,  which  appealed  to  popular  sympa- 
thies. ' '  Among  other  results  was  ]Mr.  Seward's 
re-election  to  the  Governorship  by  a  small  ma- 
jority, which  was  doubtless  due  to  the  apt  and 
enthusiastic  exertions  of  Horace  Greeley. 

The  speedy  death  of  General  Harrison — then 
an  old  man,  unable  to  endure  the  exposure  of 
inauguration  day,  or  the  exhausting  receptions 
and  public  duties  of  his  office — was  one  of 
those  instances  which  throughout  proved  the 
unfitness  of  the  Whigs  for  practical  politics. 
Still  more  so  was  the  treachery  of  John  Tyler, 
who  had  been  named  for  the  Vice-Presidency 
merely  as  a  sop  to  the  friends  of  Mr.  Clay — he 
is  said  to  have  wept  when  it  was  announced 
that  Mr.  Clay  had  been  defeated  for  the 
superior  place,  and  Mr.  Greeley  thinks  it  was 
those  tears  which  won  him  the  nomination. 
The  exasperation  of  the  baffled  and  cheated 
Whigs  gave  rise  to  scenes  of  excitement  which 
have  hardly  been  equalled  in  the  most  intense 
crises  of  the  War  against  the  Rebellion.  I 
well  remember  reading  a  debate  in  which  Mr. 
Stanley,  of  North  Carolina,  spoke  of  President 


THE    POLITICIAN.  I95 

Tyler  as  "  that  incarnate  fiend  at  the  other  end 
of  the  Avenue  !"  But  Mr.  Greeley — whose 
first  number  of  the  Tribune,  it  will  be  remem- 
bered, appeared  on  the  day  of  President  Har- 
rison's funeral  pageant  in  the  streets  of  New 
York — was  slow  to  believe  in  Tyler's  turpitude, 
and  even  found  excuses  for  Mr.  Webster's  re- 
maining in  the  Cabinet  for  months  after  all  the 
rest  had  left.  So  late  as  December,  1841,  he 
was  led  off  by  one  of  those  unaccountable  freaks 
of  playing  the  Pacificator,  which  were  the  weak- 
ness and  final  ruin  of  his  career,  to  visit  Wash- 
ington with  the  idea  that  he  "  could  be  of  ser- 
vice in  bringing  about  a  complete  reconciliation 
between  the  Administration  and  the  Whigs  in 
Congress  and  in  the  country."  The  only  re- 
sult was  to  give  long-standing  offence  to  his 
party,  and  compel  the  tardy  admission  that 
**  the  Chief  of  the  Administration  did  not  de- 
sire a  reconciliation,  upon  the  basis  of  sustain- 
ing Whig  principles  and  Whig  measures,  with 
the  party  he  had  so  deeply  wronged,  but  was 
treacherously  coquetting  with  Loco-focoism, 
and  fooled  with  the  idea  of  a  re-election." 

Though  the  Presidential  campaign  of  1844 
made  no  outward  mention  of  the  Slavery  Ques- 
tion, this  was  really  the  underlying  issue  upon 
which  it  turned.  The  slavery  propagandists 
had  long  before  fixed  their  eyes  upon  Texas, 
and  had  secured  its   independence  under  their 


196  HORACE   GREELEY. 

bandit  chief,  Sam  Houston,  in  the  spring  of 
1836.  With  the  co-operation  of  President 
Tyler  and  his  Secretary  of  State,  John  C.  Cal- 
houn, they  were  now  bending  their  energies  to 
secure  its  annexation  to  the  United  States. 
They  succeeded  in  preventing,  through  South- 
ern votes,  the  renomination  of  Mr.  Van  Buren, 
who  had  not  given  them  satisfactory  assur- 
ances, and  procuring  the  nomination  of  James 
K.  Polk,  who  had  positively  declared  himself 
an  advocate  of  immediate  annexation.  The 
Free-Soil  sentiment  of  the  New  York  Demo- 
crats was  not  sufficiently  ripened  to  carry  the 
State  against  Van  Buren 's  successful  rival,  even 
though  their  candidate  for  Governor,  Silas 
Wright,  proclaimed  in  his  speeches  that  annex- 
ation should  only  take  place  under  conditions 
which  gave  free  labor  equal  advantage  with 
slave  labor. 

When  it  came  to  the  election,  Mr.  Clay,  who 
had  at  last  received  the  nomination  of  his 
party,  had  the  infelicity  to  write  several  letters 
which  presented  him  as  opposed  to  the  annex- 
ation, though  careful  to  explain  that  it  was  not 
on  account  of  slavery.  Of  course,  this  lost  him 
the  earnest  anti-slavery  support  of  the  North, 
and  at  the  same  time  put  him  at  a  great  disad- 
vantage at  the  South.  Again  the  Whigs 
showed  their  incapacity  for  practical  politics. 
The  cloud  of  the  Liberty  Party,  though    not 


THE   POLITICIAN.  I97 

bigger  then  than  a  man's  hand  upon  the  political 
sky,  was  broadened  and  darkened  into  a  big 
enough  mass  to  eclipse  the  Whig  majority  in 
the  States  of  New  York  and  Michigan,  and  give 
pluralities  to  Polk  and  Dallas.  Mr.  Greeley's 
explanation  of  the  causes  of  this  fateful  result 
admits  **  those  Alabama  letters"  as  sufficient 
— independently  of  Mr.  Polk's  duplicity  on  the 
Tariff  Question,  the  "  Native  American"  move- 
ment, the  Plaquemine  Frauds  in  Louisiana, 
and  the  failure  to  send  a  hundred  thousand 
Tribimes  daily,  and  a  quarter  of  a  million 
weekly,  to  the  voters  of  the  land  ! 

Horace  Greeley's  exertions  in  this  campaign 
were  prodigious.  It  was  no  mere  partisan  ser- 
vice, nor  the  defence  of  what  he  deemed  the 
truths  of  political  and  moral  science.  It  was 
personal  devotion  to  the  candidate,  which  went 
back  to  the  days  of  his  boyhood.  Let  him  tell 
the  story  for  himself  :  "  I  have  admired  and 
trusted  many  statesmen  ;  I  profoundly  loved 
Henry  Clay.  ...  I  loved  him  for  his  gener- 
ous nature,  his  gallant  bearing,  his  thrilling 
eloquence,  and  his  lifelong  devotion  to  what  I 
deemed  our  country's  unity,  prosperity,  and 
just  renown.  Hence,  from  the  day  of  his 
nomination,  in  May,  to  that  of  his  defeat,  in 
November,  I  gave  every  effort,  every  thought 
to  his  election.  ...  I  gave  heart  and  soul  to 
the  canvass.     I  travelled  and   spoke  much;  I 


IqS  IIURACE    GREELEY. 

wrote,  I  think,  an  average  of  three  columns  of 
the  Tribune  each  secular  day  ;  and  I  gave  the 
residue  of  the  hours  I  could  save  from  sleep  to 
watching  the  canvass,  and  doing  whatever  I 
could  to  render  our  side  of  it  effective.  Very 
often  I  crept  to  my  lodging  near  the  office  at 
2  to  3  A.M.,  with  my  head  so  heated  by  four- 
teen to  sixteen  hours  of  incessant  reading  and 
writing  that  I  could  only  win  sleep  by  means 
of  copious  effusions  from  a  shower-bath," — the 
result  of  which,  while  probably  saving  him  from 
a  dangerous  fever,  was  an  eruption  of  myriads 
of  boils,  often  fifty  or  sixty  at  a  time,  which 
accompanied  him  with  their  torture  and  unrest 
through  the  latter  part  of  the  campaign,  and 
for  six  months  afterward. 

There  was  one  more  supreme  effort  to  be 
made  for  his  "  gallant  Harry  of  the  West," 
and  that  was  for  his  nomination  by  the  Whig 
Convention  of  1848.  But  meanwhile  Mr.  Polk 
had  done  the  bidding  of  his  Southern  masters, 
and  not  only  by  the  prestige  of  his  election 
forced  the  Annexation  measure  through  a  re- 
luctant Congress  during  the  closing  days  of 
Tyler's  administration,  but  made  it  one  of  his 
first  acts  to  send  a  military  force  to  the  Rio 
Grande  into  a  region  not  in  possession  of  the 
Texans.  Horace  Greeley's  voice  sounded  like 
a  Jeremiah's  or  a  Cassandra's  throughout  this 
shameful  and  sorely  atoned-for  episode  in  our 


THE   POLITICIAN.  I99 

national  history.  "  So  sure  as  the  universe  has 
a  Ruler,"  he  cried,  "  will  every  acre  of  terri- 
tory we  acquire  by  this  war  prove  to  our  nation 
a  curse  and  the  source  of  infinite  calamities  !" 

But  it  so  happened  that  the  little  army  sent 
to  force  a  war  on  Mexico  was  under  command 
of  one  Zachary  Taylor,  whose  swift  and  suc- 
cessful exploits,  though  less  important  than 
those  of  General  Scott,  had  taken  the  fancy  of 
the  nation  and  made  '*  Old  Zack  "  a  greater 
hero  than  "  Tippecanoe,"  or  even  "the  hero 
of  New  Orleans.*'  Being  a  Whig,  that  desper- 
ate party  was  seized  with  a  new  fever  of  "  ex- 
pediency,'* and  the  exultant  cry  went  up  that 
the  Democrats  had  outgeneralled  themselves 
by  raising  up  a  man  who  could  handle  them  as 
dexterously  in  the  political  field  as  he  had 
handled  the  Mexican  half-breeds  in  battle. 

It  was  a  death-warning,  not  to  the  Democrats 
alone,  but  to  the  devoted  friends  of  Henry 
Clay,  who  still  believed  that  he  should  have 
another  chance  for  the  Presidency,  and  who 
knew^  that  he  represented  and  could  be  intrust- 
ed with  the  great  principles  of  the  Whig  Party, 
as  General  Taylor  did  not  and  could  not.  The 
absurdity  and  peril  of  such  a  nomination  were 
forcibly  urged  by  Mr.  Greeley,  on  the  ground 
of  General  Taylor's  lack  both  of  interest  or  ex- 
perience in  politics,  having  never  even  voted  ; 
his  slight  identification  with  the  Whig  Party, 


200  HORACE    GREELEY. 

and  his  uncertain  views  of  such  questions  as 
Protection,  Internal  Improvement,  the  Cur- 
rency, and  Slavery  in  the  Territories.  As  to 
the  latter,  the  presumption  was  against  him, 
being  an  extensive  slaveholder  himself.  Be- 
sides, Mr.  Greeley  wanted  to  try  over  again 
the  issue  on  which  he  believed  the  Whigs  had 
been  cheated  of  the  election  in  1844.  lie  con- 
sidered New  York  and  Pennsylvania  sure  for 
the  party  this  time,  and  the  election  of  a  Whig 
President  morally  certain. 

The  Whigs  of  Kew  York  City  were  almost 
unanimous  for  Henry  Clay  ;  it  was  always  his 
stronghold.  But  a  small  clique  of  able  and 
adroit  politicians  did  all  they  could  for  the 
nomination  of  the  "  hero  of  Buena  Vista  ;" 
they  had  the  Courier  and  Enquirer  on  their 
side,  with  its  singularly  inconsistent  motto  at 
its  mast-head,  "  Principles,  not  ]\Icn  ;"  and 
they  had  eloquent  speakers  like  Hugh  Maxwell 
and  J.  Prescott  Hall  to  address  the  meetings 
which  they  held  weekly  at  Lafayette  Hall,  in 
Broadway,  near  Houston  Street.  The  writer 
occasionally  looked  in  upon  this  small  and  un- 
exciting gathering,  which  never  attracted  much 
attention  till  th-e  last  one,  which  met  by  ad- 
journment on  the  evening  of  the  nomination. 
Never  will  he  forget  the  scene  which  met  his 
eyes  on  arriving  at  the  spot.  An  immense 
stream   of  men   was   pouring  into  the  hall,  of 


THE    POLITICIAN.  20I 

which  they  took  possession  at  an  early  hour, 
organized  a  meeting,  and  with  thunderous 
unanimity  voted  down  the  Convention's  choice, 
and  nominated  Henry  Clay.  The  **  original 
Taylor  men,"  of  course,  were  careful  not  to 
show  themselves,  and  patiently  bided  their 
time,  knowing  that  the  reaction  would  come, 
and  doubtless  chuckling  over  the  consciousness 
that  the  select  pioneers  and  confessors  would 
be  the  better  cared  for  in  the  distribution  of 
the  spoils,  as  they  were. 

Upon  the  nomination  of  Taylor,  on  the 
fourth  ballot,  Mr.  Greeley  left  the  Convention 
in  disgust,  and  it  was  not  till  about  four 
months  after  that  he  consented  to  affix  the 
ticket  to  the  head  of  his  editorial  columns.  He 
did  not  positively  place  himself  in  opposition, 
but  sulked  in  his  tent  like  a  journalistic 
Achilles.  I  well  remember  the  night,  only  a 
few  weeks  before  the  election,  on  which  he  was 
discovered  at  one  of  the  still  select  Taylor 
meetings,  which  continued  to  be  held  at  La- 
fayette Hall.  He  was  called  upon  the  stage, 
and  in  a  characteristically  frank  and  evidently 
reluctant  speech,  announced  his  intention  to 
support  the  Whig  nominee.  In  fact,  he  re- 
minded his  audience  that  from  the  beginning 
he  had  pledged  himself  to  do  so,  if  he  saw  no 
other  way  of  defeating  General  Cass,  the  regu- 
lar Democratic  candidate.     He  now  saw  no 


202  HORACE    GREELEY. 

alternative  between  Cass  and  Taylor,  and  was 
ready  to  redeem  his  pledge.  The  most  sig- 
nificant part  of  his  speech  was  that  he  laid  the 
greatest  stress  upon  the  bearing  of  the  elec- 
tion on  the  question  of  freedom  in  the  Terri- 
tories. The  secret  of  his  hesitation  had  doubt- 
less been  that  a  third  ticket  had  been  put  in 
the  neld  upon  that  very  issue,  headed  by  I^Iar- 
tin  Van  Buren  and  Charles  Francis  Adams,  in 
addition  to  the  fact  that  the  Whig  Convention 
had  been  careful  to  vote  down  a  resolution  on 
that  point.  But  it  had  now  become  clear  that 
everv  Whi^  vote  for  this  ticket  could  onlv  go  to 
the  election,  in  General  Cass,  of  one  of  the  most 
subservient  Northern  tools  of  the  sla\'e  power. 
Addressing  himself  to  those  'and  the  whole  as- 
sembly vociferously  avowed  themselves  as  such) 
"to  whom  the  question  of  extending  or  re- 
stricting slavery  outweighed  all  other  consid- 
erations," he  asked  them  "  what  hope  they 
had  of  keeping  slavery  o^ut  of  California  and 
New  Mexico  vrith  General  Cass  as  President, 
and  a  Loco-foco  Congress  ;"  and  again,  "  How 
would  South  Carolina  and  Texas  wish  you  to 
voter"  He  felt  no  assurance  of  General  Tay- 
lor's soundness  on  this  question,  but  believed 
him  clearly  pledged  by  his  letters  to  interpose 
no  veto  to  the  legislation  of  Congress  ;  and  he 
believed  that  a  Whig  Congress,  which  could 
only  be  secured  by  the  triumph  of  the   Presi- 


THE   POLITICIAN. 


203 


dential   ticket,    would   not   consent   to   extend 
slavery. 

This  speech  decided  the   question.      Greeley 
with    his    Tribune    and    Seward    in  the    forum 
carried  the  anti-slavery  Whigs  almost  in  a  body 
over  to   Taylor  ;  and    Mr.  Van  Buren  was   left 
with  the  support  mostly  of  the  Free-Soil  Dem- 
ocrats, thus  drawing  almost  exclusively  from 
the  forces  of  General    Cass.     General  Taylor 
was  elected  by  a  large  plurality  ;   and  with  the 
usual  ill-fortune  of  the  Whigs,  he  had  scarcely 
begun  to  approve  himself,  even  to  Mr.  Greeley, 
as  not  only  "  an  honest,   wise,  fearless  public 
servant,"    but    as    a    stanch    Whig,   when    he 
"died  also,"— and    Mr.    Fillmore  played    the 
Tyler  with  the  Free-Soil  Whigs  of  New  York, 
in   whose   interests  he  was  nominated   for  the 
Vice-Presidency. 

In  reviewing  that  election  in  after  years,  Mr. 
Greeley  says  that  the  contest  had  been  fought, 
not  on  principles,  but  on  candidates  ;  it  was 
simply  the  preference  by  a  majority  of  Zachary 
Taylor  to  Lewis  Cass.  Hence  the  very  House, 
elected  with  or  under  Taylor,  was  organized  to 
oppose  his  administration.  "The  Whigs 
could  not  say  with  Pyrrhus,  '  Another  such  vic- 
tory, and  I  am  ruined  !'  This  one  sufficed  to 
disintegrate  and  destroy  their  organization. 
They  were  at  once  triumphant  and  undone." 
But  much  more  significant"  was  his  subsequent 


204  HORACE    GREELEV. 

confession  :  "  When  a  resolve  opposing  the 
Wilmot  Proviso  was  laid  on  the  table  at  the 
Convention,  ...  I  felt  that  my  zeal,  my  en- 
thusiasm for  the  Whig  cause  was  also  laid 
there." 


CHAPTER   XIII. 

THE   POLITICIAN  :    THE   FREE-SOIL   STRUGGLE. 

It  is  now  time  to  gather  up  those  strands  in 
Horace  Greeley's  previous  life  which  deter- 
mined his  making  the  above  declaration,  and 
which  brought  him  on  the  threshold  of  "  the 
new  era  in  politics,"  as  he  calls  it.  Among 
the  early  recollections  which  made  the  most 
impression  on  his  mind  was  a  fugitive  slave- 
chase.  New  York  had  so  framed  its  ordinance 
of  emancipation  that  certain  born  slaves  should 
remain  such  till  twenty-eight  years  old,  and  one 
of  this  class  had  stepped  over  the  line  and  was 
at  work  in  Poultney,  whither  his  master,  "  with 
due  process  and  following,  came  to  reclaim  and 
recover  the  goods."  With  a  unanimous  and 
instinctive  impulse  the  village  was  instantly 
swarming  on  the  green  ;  "  and  the  result 
was  a  speedy  disappearance  of  the  chattel, 
and  the  return  of  the  master,  disconsolate  and 
niggerless,  to  the  place  whence  he  came." 
"  Our  people,"  adds  Horace,  "  hated  injustice 
and  oppression,  and  acted  as  if  they  couldn't 
help  it."  His  next  record  of  himself  on  this 
subject  was,  that  "  though  a  child   of  seven  to 


2o6  I[(~)RACE   GREELEY. 

ton  years,"  he  "  heartily  sympathized  with  the 
Northern  uprising  against  the  admission  of 
Missouri  as  a  slave  State,  and  shared  in  the 
disappointment  and  chagrin  so  widely  felt  when 
that  uprising  was  circumvented  and  defeated 
by  what  was  called  a  compromise."  And  yet, 
as  respects  any  further  political  action  for  the 
remaining  fourteen  or  fifteen  years  (1821-35), 
we  find  him  sharing  the  almost  universal  dis- 
position to  ignore  the  subject,  and  to  treat  the 
handful  of  agitators  with  silent  contempt,  or 
at  least  to  wink  at  the  usual  hootings,  occa- 
sional rotten-egging,  and  rare  personal  violence, 
which  attended  their  career.  He  could  not 
withhold  from  these  people,  he  tells  us,  a  cer- 
tain measure  of  sympathy,  but  was  unable  to 
see  how  their  efforts  tended  to  the  achieve- 
ment of  their  end.  "  Conservative  by  instinct 
and  by  tradition,"  he  was  "  disinclined  to 
leave  a  practical  good  within  reach  for  an  ideal 
good  that  was  clearly  unattainable."  Hence 
he  gave  the  Abolitionists  a  wide  berth,  and 
"  for  years  regarded  with  complacency  the 
Colonization  movement." 

We  find  him  going  much  further  than  this  in 
an  article  written  for  the  New  Yorker  in  1834, 
in  the  usual  philosophical  tone  of  that  day. 
After  pronouncing  the  framersof  the  Constitu- 
tion "  wise  in  avoiding  all  discussion  of  a  sub- 
ject so  delicate  and  exciting, "  and  in  "  leaving 


THE    POLITICIAN.  20/ 

each  section  in  the  possession  of  its  undoubted 
right  of  regulating  its  own  internal  government 
and  enjoying  its  own  speculative  opinions," 
he  asks  :  * '  Why  should  not  this  arrangement  be 
satisfactory  and  perfect?"  He  "hazards  the 
assertion"  that  two  such  distinct  races  as  the 
whites  and  blacks  of  the  United  States  could 
not  possibly  live  together  on  terms  of  political 
and  social  equality.  He  even  "  ventures  to 
assert  "  that  if  the  Southern  people  could  only 
have  "  the  objections  to  slavery,  drawn  from  a 
correct  and  enlightened  political  economy, 
once  fairly  laid  before  them,  they  would  need 
no  other  inducements  to  impel  them  to  enter 
upon  an  immediate  and  effective  course  of  leg- 
islation with  a  view  to  the  utter  extinction  of 
the  evil."  Here  we  have  a  very  early  illustra- 
tion of  the  almost  infantile  confidence  in  the 
reasonableness  and  placability  of  the  slave 
power,  which  no  words  or  acts  on  their  part 
could  long  suppress,  and  which  rose  at  length 
to  an  infatuation  that  led  him  to  wreck  his  life- 
work  by  a  suicidal  casting  of  himself  away  upon 
their  syren  reefs. 

It  will  be  seen,  from  our  previous  narrative 
of  Mr.  Greeley's  course  in  the  campaign  of  1844, 
that  he  had  been  growing  in  grace  on  the 
question  of  slavery  as  a  Whig.  Slavery  had 
now  become  a  practical  question  within  the 
Constitution,  by  an   aggressive  movement  to 


2CS  HORACE  «1(KEUET. 


create  new  slave  States  oat  of  £ree  soil,  or  ter- 
ritofy  not  indaded  within  the  scope  of  the 
Conslituticwial  Compioaiise.  The  seizure  of 
Texas  and  the  War  widi  Mcsaco  made  it  evi- 
dent diat  instrad  of  an  nnf  cMtnnate  victim  of 
orenmstancesiy  to  be  dealt  with  in  peculiar 
fairness  and  g^eneroaty,  the  slave  power  was  a 
political  panther,  intent  not  npon  national  tol> 
eiattion,  but  upon  national  controL  "  When 
we  find  the  Union  on  the  brink   : :   i  r:  j  n- 

jnst  and  rapacicMis  war,**  was 
note  which  Mr.  Gredley  sounded 
Trshvmr,  "  inst^ated  wfaoIlj(as      :  ~  : 
daimed)   by  a  determination  : 
fortify-  slavciy,4hen  we  do  nott  5 
ioi^^er  be  rationally  disputed   :      : 
has  much,  veiy  much,  to  do  wl :  .  If 

we  ni^be  diawn  in  to  fi^it  for  it,  it  would  be 
hard  indeed  that  we  shoold  not  be  allowed  to 
talk  of  it.*'  He  never  hesitated  to  pronoonce 
the  wh<ile  series  of  events,  from  the  invasion 
of  Texas  by  Houston  and  the  other  alleged 
"  ccrfonists^*'  to  the  repeal  of  the  Missouri 
Compromise  and  the  *'  bocder  mfliaii'*  a^res- 
sionsi,  as  the  "  acts  of  a  drama  of  naked 

villainy/*  whose  *' '  being's  end  and  aim'  were 
the  aggrandizement  of  the  Slave  Power." 

Another  event  that  opened  his  ejres  and  fired 
his  heart  was  the  '*  martyidom  "  of  the  Rev. 
Elijah  P.   Lovqoy,  the  publisher  of  an  anti- 


THE   POLITICIAN.  209 

slavery  religious  paper  at  Alton,  111.  After  hav- 
ing two  printing-presses  destroyed  by  the  mob, 
this  undaunted  and  perhaps  unduly  obstinate 
man,  with  a  few  friends,  was  defending  his 
third  press,  just  received,  when  he  was  shot 
dead  by  one  of  his  assailants.  The  fact  that 
this  outrage  occurred  in  a  free  State,  and  that 
no  legal  justice  was  ever  meted  out  tothemiir- 
derers,  or  restitution  made  to  the  family  for 
their  loss  of  property,  was  what  most  awakened 
Mr.  Greeley  and  the  slumbering  anti-slaver;.' 
sentiment  of  the  North;  and  the  stddlt.zr.i. 
fact,  that  the  whole  tone  of  the  messarts  :: 
President  Jackson,  Governor  Marcy,  ar.  -  ::..esr 
officials  was  to  set  forth  this  fate  of  Lovejov  as 
his  just  deserts,  compelled  him  to  realize  tr.i: 
the  battle  must  be  first  fought  in  the  North. 

And  yet  he  clung  to  the  Whig  Part\*.  th:  :rh 
he  felt  its  timbers  parting  beneath  his  fee:,  He 
saw  that  the  policyof  the  Taylor  Administration 
was  disposed  to  secure  new  territory  to  freedom, 
but  only  by  covert  and  compromise  measures, 
— in  fact,  to  do  little  more  than  to  tide  over 
the  breakers  ahead  during  its  own  brief  tenn. 
He  took  the  stump  in  Vermont  for  the  Whigs, 
who  were  threatened  with  defeat  by  a  coalition 
of  the  Democrats  with  the  Abolitionists  on 
an  unequivocally  Free-Soil  platform.  He  gave  a 
partial  and  qualified  support  to  Mr.  Clay's  com- 
promise measure.      He  beheld  the  great  pillar 


2IO  HORACE    GREELEY. 

of  Whiggery,  Mr.  Webster,  retracing  his  steps 
and  eating  his  own  words  in  trembling  haste 
before  a  Southern  Whig  vote,  which  had  already- 
sunk  to  twenty-nine  members  of  the  House 
out  of  sixty-two,  that  were  returned  in  the  elec- 
tions which  followed  General  Taylor's  election 
by  a  majority  of  the  South. 

Horace  Greeley  was  thus,  by  his  own  con- 
fession, numbered  with  the  moderates  during 
the  great  struggle  and  debate  wherein  the 
"  Adjustment"  was  assailed  by  zealous  anti- 
slavery  men  like  Hale,  Chase,  and  Seward,  on 
the  one  hand,  and  by  zealous,  aggressive  pro- 
slavery  men  like  Calhoun,  Jeff.  Davis,  Mason, 
and  Butler,  on  the  other.  The  measure,  how- 
ever, had  been  so  altered  in  the  interests  of 
slavery,  that  it  would  probably  have  failed  had 
it  not  been  for  the  sudden  death  of  President 
Taylor,  and  the  accession  of  Millard  Fillmore, 
who  had  hastened  to  follow  the  lead  of  Daniel 
Webster.  The  measure,  which  was  finally 
passed,  under  the  vain  delusion  that  it  \vould 
hush  the  gathering  storm,  with  its  fugitive-slave 
law  and  the  exposing  of  territory  to  slavehold- 
ing  aggression,  proved  to  be  a  direful  sowing 
of  dragon's  teeth. 

In  the  election  of  1S52  Horace  Greeley  en- 
gaged in  the  forlorn  hope  of  electing  General 
Scott  as  the  candidate  of  the  Whig  Party, 
whose  nomination  he  had  been  effective  in  se- 


THE   POLITICIAN.  211 

curing  as  against  Fillmore  and  Webster,  though 
he  emphatically  repudiated  the  "  doughface" 
platform,  and  ran  his  candidates  on  a  platform 
of  his  own.  This  Greeley  platform,  while  con- 
ceding non-interference  by  Congress  with  slav- 
ery in  the  slave  States,  opposed  the  legaliza- 
tion of  slavery  in  any  national  territory,  or  the 
acquisition  of  any  foreign  territory  wherein 
slavery  already  existed  ;  also  the  hunting  of 
fugitive  slaves  in  free  States  ;  together  with 
an  inflexible  testimony  that  human  slavery  is 
morally  wrong,  and  ought  to  be  speedily  ter- 
minated. Another,  and  the  foremost  '*  plank" 
in  this  platform  took  strong  protective  ground 
on  the  Tariff  Question.  This  doctrine  was 
really  tne  last  strand  which  held  him  to  the 
Whig  Party  ;  he  gives  the  soundness  of  Scott 
and  Graham  on  this  issue,  together  with  his 
belief  that  they  could  be  elected,  as  the  only 
reasons  for  his  support  of  them.  We  may  here 
simply  mention  the  remaining  planks  :  Liberal 
appropriations  by  the  Federal  Government  for 
improvement  of  rivers  and  harbors  ;  transcon- 
tinental railroads  and  other  great  enterprises 
calculated  to  strengthen  the  Union  and  con- 
tribute to  the  national  defence  ;  one  Presiden- 
tial term  ;  a  reform  in  the  system  of  payment 
and  mileage  in  Congress  ;  "  more  regard  for, 
and  less  cant  about,  State  Rights. "  His  plank 
on  "  Foreign   Policy"  was  a  rather  unintelli- 


212  HORACE   GREELEY. 

gible  see-saw,  composed  of  the  Golden  Rule 
and  a  "  firm  front  to  tyrants,  a  prompt  rebuke 
to  every  outrage  on  the  law  of  nations  ;"  "no 
evasion  of  duties  or  shuffling  of  responsibili- 
ties, .  .  .  and  a  generous,  active  sympathy 
with  the  victims  of  tyranny  and  usurpation." 

General  Scott's  stupendous  vanity  made  him 
confident  of  triumph  to  the  very  night  of  elec- 
tion, but  we  doubt  whether  even  Mr.  Greeley 
was  able  to  whistle  loud  enough  through  the 
Tribune  to  keep  his  own  or  his  readers'  courage 
up.  With  few  exceptions,  at  least,  it  was  felt 
that  the  Whig  Party  was  dead  and  gone. 
Political  shades  still  continued  for  many  years 
to  flit  across  the  scene,  whispering  ghostily 
that  they  were  "  old-line  Whigs. "  Endeavors 
were  made  to  reconstruct  out  of  its  di!bris  a 
party,  figure-headed  by  Millard  Fillmore,  which 
should  dodge  the  slavery  question  by  diverting 
the  issue  to  that  of  "  Americanism"  (or 
"  Know-nothingism") — ultimately  to  be  sold 
out  to,  or  absorbed  into,  the  Democratic.  The 
dam  had  broken,  and  the  great  Whig  reservoir 
was  swelling  the  resistless  stream  of  tendency 
which  was  sweeping  all  before  it  toward  the 
en";ulfinfT  chasm  of  civil  war.  Even  the  old 
generation  of  leaders  and  statesmen  passed 
away  at  this  time.  Henry  Clay  died  June 
24th,  1852,  and  Daniel  Webster  on  October 
24th.     Just  before  the  death  of   the  former. 


THE    POLITICIAN.  213 

Mr.  Greeley  had  the  great  but  sad  satisfaction 
of  a  half  hour's  free  and  friendly  conversation, 
in  his  sick-room  at  Washington,  with  the  chief- 
tain whom  he  had  so  loved  and  gallantly  fought 
for.  Though  in  the  last  stages  of  disease  and 
debility,  **  his  mind  was  unclouded  and  brill- 
iant as  ever  ;  and,  though  all  personal  ambi- 
tion had  long  been  banished,  his  interest  in  the 
events  and  impulses  of  the  day  was  nowise  di- 
minished." Mr.  Greeley  carried  away  the  im- 
pression that  "  Mr.  Clay  regretted  that  more 
care  had  not  been  taken  to  divest  the  fugitive- 
slave  law  of  features  needlessly  repulsive  to 
Northern  sentiment." 

Horace  Greeley  had  been  the  most  indepen- 
dent of  Whigs.  He  was  now  a  free  man,  as  re- 
spected party.  He  never  again  was  fairly 
harnessed  to  party  shafts,  nor  belonged  to  any- 
thing but  a  Greeley  party,  which  wiggled 
strangely  thereafter  from  side  to  side  of  the 
road. 

The  "  new  era  in  politics"  which  was  now 
openfng  before  him  was  briefly  this.  As  we 
are  not  writing  history,  but  biography,  we  pre- 
sent the  situation  as  seen  through  his  eyes. 
Alongside  of  the  mushroom  growth  of  the 
Know-nothing  party,  sprang  up  the  most  rapid 
and  effective  political  movement  in  American 
history.     The  man,  wdiose  personality  and  po- 


214  HORACE   GREELEY. 

litical  ambitions  were  the  occasion  of  this  great 
revolution,  was  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  a  Ver- 
monter  by  birth  and  a  Democratic  Senator  from 
Illinois  at  the  time  of  President  Pierce's  elec- 
tion, and  Chairman  of  the  Committee  on  Ter- 
ritories. His  course  all  along  had  been  that 
of  an  extreme  partisan  and  a  subservient  tool 
of  the  slave  power.  Taking  advantage  of  his 
position,  in  the  short  session  of  1852-53  he 
introduced  a  bill  to  organize  the  Territory  of 
Nebraska.  It  was  opposed  by  the  pro-slavery 
leaders,  led  by  Senator  Atchison,  of  Missouri, 
since  this  was  a  part  of  the  territory  conceded 
and  consecrated  to  free  labor  by  the  Missouri 
Compromise  of  1820.  In  the  succeeding  ses- 
sion (1853-54)  Mr.  Douglas  again  brought  up 
his  bill,  seeking  to  obviate  the  objection  of  the 
slaveholders  by  suggesting  that  the  Missouri 
Compromise  had  been  annulled  in  this  respect 
by  the  Compromise  of  1850.  The  South,  how- 
ever, was  not  content  with  an  irresponsible  in- 
terpretation, and  introduced  a  bill  that  the  in- 
terdict of  slave-labor  be  expressly  repealed. 
Mr.  Douglas  acquiesced,  and  added  to  his  bill 
what  he  called  its  **  true  intent  and  meaning'* 
— namely,  "  neither  to  legislate  slaverjMnto  the 
Territory  in  question,  nor  to  exclude  it  there- 
from," but  to  leave  the  matter  to  the  people 
thereof  for  themselves.  As  thus  amended  or 
defined  (and  with  the  alteration  that  an  addi- 


THE   POLITICIAN.  21  5 

tional  territory,  to  be  called  Kansas,  lying  di- 
rectly west  of  Missouri,  should  be  carved  out 
of  the  original  Nebraska),  the  bill  passed  the 
Senate  by  35  to  13  votes,  and  the  House  by 
113  to  100,  and  was  signed  by  President  Pierce. 
Thereupon  began  the  struggle  for  the  pos- 
session of  this  debatable  ground  between  the 
Northern  settlers  and  the  emissaries  of  slavery  ; 
and,  even  earlier,  the  arousing  of  the  North  to 
resist  the  whole  scheme,  and  reopening  of  the 
question.  Into  this  work  of  arousing  and  of 
resisting,  Horace  Greeley  cast  himself  without 
reserve,  and  with  all  the  force  which  he  and  his 
great  journal  could  exert.  His  eyes  were  now 
fully  open  to  the  impossibility  of  any  com- 
promise with  the  South  which  could  insure  the 
freedom  of  the  Territories,  much  less  the  con- 
finement of  slavery  to  its  present  limits, — in 
fact,  which  did  not  amount  to  a  partnership  in 
the  rights  and  extension  of  slaveholding  as  of 
any  other  property  ;  and  his  mission  was  now 
to  open  the  eyes  of  his  countrymen.  It  was  a 
work  which  did  itself ^  or  which  "  our  friends, 
the  enemy,"  accomplished  more  effectually 
than  ourselves.  "  The  passage  of  the  Ne- 
braska  Bill,"  says  Mr.  Greeley,  "  was  a  death- 
blow to  Northern  quietism  and  complacency, 
mistakingly  deeming  themselves  conservatism. 
To  all  who  had  fondly  dreamed,  or  blindly 
hoped,  that  the  slavery  question  would  some- 


2l6  HORACE   GREELEY. 

how  settle  itself,  it  cried,  "  Sleep  no  more  !"  in 
thunder  tones  that  would  not  die  unheeded. 
Every  new  surrender  on  the  part  of  the  North 
was  seen  to  provoke  a  new  exaction  in  the 
name  of  the  South.  Systematic,  determined 
resistance  was  now  recognized  as  imperative 
duty.  That  resistance  could  only  be  rendered 
effective  through  a  distinct,  compact  political 
organization.  That  organization  was  therefore 
resolved  on,  spontaneously  and  simultaneously, 
by  a  million  Northern  firesides.  It  was  earliest 
effected  in  the  West,  but  had  pervaded  nearly 
every  free  State  before  the  close  of  1854,  and 
had  assumed  almost  everywhere  a  common 
designation, — that  of  the  Republican  Party." 

Mr.  Greeley  was  a  member  of  the  first  Re- 
publican or  "anti-Nebraska"  State  Conven- 
tion, in  the  fall  of  1854,  at  Saratoga  Springs. 
It  was  thought  best  to  postpone  nominations, 
and  the  result  was  an  adoption  qf  the  Prohibi- 
tion and  Whig  ticket,  headed  by  Myron  H. 
Clark  and  Henry  J.  Raymond,  for  Governor 
and  Lieutenant-Governor.  By  means  of  the 
running  of  two  Democratic  tickets,  called 
the  "soft"  and  the  "hard,"  on  account  of 
their  tendencies  on  the  slavery  question,  and 
the  running  of  an  American  ticket,  the  new 
party  succeeded  in  electing  its  candidates  and 
the  Legislature,  a  majority  of  which  had  been 
secretly  secured  for  the  return  of  William  H. 


THE   POLITICIAN.  21/ 

Seward  to  the  United  States  Senate.  It  was 
at  this  time  that  Mr.  Greeley  took  occasion  to 
write  his  private  letter  to  Mr.  Seward,  which 
six  years  afterward  was  made  public  with  such 
sensational  results,  and  of  which  we  shall  have 
more  to  say  anon. 

The  great  national  battle  opened  with  the 
Thirty-fourth  Congress  on  the  question  of  or- 
ganization. Instinctively  feeling  that  this  ses- 
sion would  be  of  momentous  interest  and  re- 
sults, Horace  Greeley  resolved  to  be  on  the 
spot  to  watch,  report,  and  take  a  hand,  in  the 
imbroglio  as  long  as  his  associates  in  the  Trib- 
U7ie  deemed  his  presence  there  more  important 
than  in  New  York.  It  was  at  this  time  that 
the  recently  published  letters  to  his  managing 
editor,  Mr.  Dana,  were  written.  They  strik- 
ingly illustrate  the  intentness  with  which  he 
watched  Congress  with  one  eye  and  the  columns 
of  the  Tribime  with  the  other,  and  his  almost 
frantic  solicitude  at  the  effect  of  every  unguard- 
ed word  in  the  latter  upon  the  objects  for  which 
he  was  doing  such  valuable  service  in  the 
former.  In  fact,  the  heart  of  this  heavy-laden 
man  is  laid  here  before  us,  with  all  its  weakness 
and  its  patient  or  passionate  strength,  so  that 
our  hearts  go  out  toward  him  with  a  pity  which 
does  not  prevent  our  realizing  the  greatness  of 
a  Samsonian  self-devotion,  and  of  prodigious 
labors. 


2l8  HORACE   GREELEY. 

He  took  his  seat  at  the  reporters'  desk  on 
December  3d,  1855,  and  remained  at  his  post 
for  several  weeks.  The  election  of  Speaker  was 
to  be  the  key-note  of  the  whole  character  and 
course  of  the  Congress.  The  Republicans  and 
the  Americans  had  a  majority  ;  but  the  compli- 
cations of  the  latter  with  the  Southern  questions 
and  their  affiliations  with  the  South,  prevented 
their  working  together  against  the  Southern- 
ers,— who,  in  turn,  were  divided  between 
the  candidate  of  the  Democratic  caucus,  and 
a  couple  of  "  Whigs"  who  were  favored  by 
the  "  Know-nothings."  The  Republicans  and 
the  anti-Nebraska  Americans  held  no  caucus, 
but  scattered  their  votes  between  Lewis  D. 
Campbell  of  Ohio,  N.  P.  Banks  of  Massachu- 
setts, Mr.  Pennington  of  New  Jersey,  and  sev- 
eral others.  At  the  close  of  the  week  Mr. 
Campbell  withdrew,  and  Mr.  Banks's  vote 
steadily  rose  to  107  on  the  thirty-seventh  bal- 
lot, lacking  only  six  of  a  majority,  and  re- 
mained at  about  that  point  till  January  21st, 
when  Mr.  Albert  Rust  of  Arkansas  (afterward 
a  Rebel  Brigadier)  proposed  that  the  friends 
of  the  four  leading  candidates  be  requested  to 
withdraw  their  names.  Mr.  Fuller  (supported 
by  pro-slavery  Whigs  and  Americans)  and  Mr. 
Pennington  immediately  gave  notice  that  they 
were  no  longer  candidates,  but  there  was  no 
disposition  on  the  part  of  Mr.  Richardson,  the 


THE    POLITICIAN.  219 

regular  Democratic  nominee,  or  of  Mr.  Banks, 
to  follow  suit  ;  and  Mr.  Rust's  proposition,  after 
lying  open  for  two  or  three  days,  was  tabled.  In 
the  mean  time,  Mr.  Greeley  had  expressed  him- 
self concerning  it,  in  his  correspondence  with 
the  Tribune,  in  a  highly  indignant  manner,  as 
at  a  "  humiliating"  and  "  discreditable  propo- 
sition"— an  attempt,  on  the  part  of  two  hostile 
minorities — to  ensnare  Mr.  Banks  to  decline. 
As  Banks  had  repeatedly  offered  to  withdraw 
at  the  request  of  his  supporters,  and  had  been 
upheld  by  them  with  unwavering  steadiness, 
and  as  he  had,  moreover,  offered  to  abide  by  the 
result  of  a  plurality  election,  Mr.  Greeley  pro- 
nounced the  proposal  of  Rust  an  **  indignity." 
On  the  day  when  this  Tribune  was  received 
at  Washington,  Mr.  Greeley,  after  the  adjourn- 
ment, was  proceeding  down  from  the  Capitol 
with  two  gentlemen,  when  a  stranger  requested 
a  word  with  him.  He  stopped,  and  his  com- 
panions passed  on.  He  describes  the  man  as 
a  stranger  to  him,  "  in  the  prime  of  life,  six 
feet  high,  and  weighing  over  two  hundred." 
After  asking,  **  Is  your  name  Greeley?"  and 
receiving  an  affirmative  reply,  the  man  asked, 
"  Are  you  a  non-combatant  ?"  To  which  Greeley 
answered, "  That  is  according  to  circumstances. " 
So  little  did  Mr.  Greeley  take  the  intimation 
of  the  last  question,  that  he  still  held  his 
hands    in    his    great-coat    pockets,    and    was 


220  HORACE   GREELEY. 

thus  utterly  helpless  against  several  blows  on 
the  right  side  of  his  head,  which  temporarily 
stunned  and  sent  him  staggering  against  the 
fence  of  the  Capitol  grounds.  On  rallying,  he 
demanded,  "  Who  is  this  man  ?"  but  received 
no  reply  immediately,  except  from  the  rufifian, 
who  said  with  an  oath,  "  You'll  know  me  soon 
enough  !"  and  turned  on  his  heel  and  went 
down  the  street.  After  he  had  gone  his  name 
was  announced  as  Albert  C-  Rust,  of  Arkansas. 
Mr.  Greeley,  recovering  his  consciousness,  pro- 
ceeded on  his  way,  attended  by  two  friends, 
who  dropped  behind  at  Four-and-a-half  Street 
to  speak  to  acquaintances.  Near  his  hotel,  the 
National,  his  assailant,  who  was  in  the  midst 
of  a  throng  of  friends,  and  probably  awaiting 
him,  turned  short  upon  him  and  said,  "  Do 
you  know  me  now?"  to  which  he  answered, 
"Yes,  you  are  Rust  of  Arkansas."  The  lat- 
ter said  something  about  what  he  would  do  if 
Greeley  was  a  combatant,  whereupon  Greeley 
dauntlessly  replied  that  he  claimed  no  exemp- 
tion on  that  account.  Rust  then  struck  him 
with  a  heavy  cane,  that  was  broken  by  the  arm 
which  he  raised  to  protect  himself.  His  arm 
was  badly  swelled  by  the  blow,  as  his  head  was 
by  the  previous  assault  ;  but  he  neither  fell 
nor  recoiled,  but  tried  to  close  with  his  assail- 
ant, who  was  endeavoring  to  repeat  his  stroke, 
when  several  persons  interposed,  and  the  bully 


THE   POLITICIAN.  221 

**  whirled  away"  again.  "  I  did  not  strike 
him  at  all,"  writes  Mr.  Greeley  in  the  cool  way 
he  had  under  real  or  extreme  provocations, 
"  nor  lay  a  finger  on  him  ;  but  it  certainly 
would  have  been  a  pleasure  to  me  had  I  been 
able  to  perform  the  public  duty  of  knocking 
him  down.  I  cannot  mistake  the  movement 
of  his  hand  on  the  avenue,  and  am  sure  it 
must  have  been  toward  a  pistol  in  his  belt." 

Mr.  Greeley  was  confined  to  his  room  for 
several  days,  but  was  able  to  continue  his  ed- 
itorial work.  It  was  the  first  time  he  had  ever 
been  seriously  assaulted  in  all  his  life  of  plain- 
speaking  and  denunciation  ;  but  it  was  not 
wholly  unexpected,  for  "  I  came  here,"  he  wTote, 
**  with  a  clear  understanding  that  it  was  about 
an  even  chance  whether  I  should  or  should  not 
be  allowed  to  go  home  alive.  .  .  .  But  I  shall 
stay  here  just  so  long  as  I  think  proper,  using 
great  plainness  of  speech,  but  endeavoring  to 
treat  all  men  justly  and  faithfully.  ...  I 
shall  carry  no  weapons  and  engage  in  no 
brawls  ;  but  if  ruffians  waylay  and  assail  me,  I 
certainly  shall  not  run,  and,  so  far  as  able,  I 
shall  defend  myself.  ...  If  Rust's  assaults 
were  intended  to  convince  me  that  his  propo- 
sition was  fair  and  manly,  they  certainly  failed 
to  subserve  their  purpose."  Horace  Greeley's 
moral  courage  was  never  questioned,  but  some 
have  endeavored  to  draw  a  fine  distinction  be- 


222  HORACE   GREELEY. 

tween  this  and  a  lack  of  physical  courage  ;  but 
neither  in  the  above  incident,  nor  in  his  cahn 
indifference  during  the  night  of  the  expected 
sack  of  the  Tribune  office  by  the  "  Bloody 
Sixth"  mob,  nor  in  his  intrepid  conduct  and 
self-exposure  during  the  "  Draft  Riots"  in 
1863,  do  we  find  the  slightest  trace  of  coward- 
ice of  any  kind,  especially  when  we  remember 
that  this  man  never  carried  weapons,  offensive 
or  defensive. 

The  reason  why  this  assault  created  a  less  wide 
and  lasting  sensation  than  that  upon  Charles 
Sumner,  which  occurred  only  a  few  weeks  later, 
was  partly  because  Mr.  Greeley's  injuries  were 
of  transient  duration,  and  partly  because  his 
usual  disinclination  to  bring  suit  was  increased 
by  the  small  prospect  of  a  verdict  from  a  Wash- 
ington jury  ;  as  to  a  criminal  suit,  he  would 
not  himself  be  even  suspected  of  instigating 
that,  and,  of  course,  the  Washington  authori- 
ties of  that  day  would  not  initiate  proceedings 
against  a  Southern  member  of  Congress.  He 
indulged  the  belief  that  by  his  treatment  of 
Rust  he  had  made  him  somewhat  ashamed  of 
his  conduct. 

The  contest  for  Speaker  kept  on  till  Febru- 
ary 2d  (nine  weeks),  when  a  motion  was  offered 
by  a  Democrat,  Mr.  Samuel  A.  Smith  of  Ten- 
nessee, that  the  House  proceed  to  elect  a 
Speaker  viva  voce,  and  that,  after  the  calling  of 


THE   POLITICIAN.  223 

the  roll  three  times  without  a  majority  for  any 
one,  the  roll  should  be  again  called,  and  the 
member  who  should  receive  the  largest  number 
of  votes  should  be  declared  elected.  This  was 
adopted  by  a  vote  of  113  to  104,  seven  tired 
Democrats  voting  with  the  majority,  where- 
upon Mr.  Banks  received,  on  the  one  hundred 
and  thirty-third  ballot,  103  votes,  to  100  for 
William  Aikin  of  South  Carolina,  and  eleven 
scattering  "  Whig"  and  **  Know-nothing"  votes. 
This  long  struggle  has  been  pronounced 
**  memorable"  by  Mr.  Greeley,  "  as  the  very 
first  in  our  national  history  wherein  Northern 
resistance  to  slavery  extension  ever  won  in  a 
fair,  stand-up  contest,  without  compromise  or 
equivocation.  .  .  .  And  there  were  not  sev- 
enty-five decided  Republicans  in  the  House  of 
234  members  in  which  it  was  achieved.  .  .  . 
The  long  contest  had  proved  the  **  American" 
organization  a  mist,  a  fog-bank,  an  illusion  ; 
and  the  new-born  Republican  Party,  consoli- 
dated and  united  by  this  struggle,  mustered 
heartily  and  formidably  at  its  first  Convention, 
which  assembled  at  Pittsburgh,  Pa.,  on  the  22d 
of  that  month." 


CHAPTER   XIV. 

THE      POLITICIAN  :     WITH     THE     REPUBLICAN 

PARTY. 

That  Convention  nominated  Colonel  John 
C.  Fremont  for  President,  with  the  entire  con- 
currence of  Mr.  Greeley,  who  thought  that  the 
nomination  of  so  adventurous  and  heroic  a 
"  pioneer"  would  be  popular,  especially  with 
young  men.  He  opposed  at  the  same  time  the 
policy  of  naming  Judge  McLean  of  Ohio,  or 
any  others  who  were  urged  on  the  ground  of 
their  being  able  to  draw  a  large  proportion  of 
the  "American"  vote.  Previously  to  this,  the 
Democrats  had  made  a  singularly  strong  nom- 
ination in  James  Buchanan,  who  had  escaped 
any  identification  with  the  Nebraska  Bill  by 
being  absent  as  Envoy  to  Great  Britain  during 
Pierce's  administration,  and  who  was  expected 
to  run  well  in  Pennsylvania,  which  was  regarded 
as  the  pivot  of  the  contest.  The  "  Ameri- 
cans" had  also  nominated  Millard  Fillmore. 
But  Fillmore  could  not  possibly  be  accepted 
by  the  Republicans,  nor  could  his  party  be  in- 
duced to  run  "  combined"  tickets  in  the  elec- 
tion.    After   a  gallant    but  hopeless  fight    by 


THE   POLITICIAN.  22$ 

the  Republicans,  Mr.  Buchanan  was  elected  by 
a  majority  of  electoral  votes,  and  a  plurality  of 
nearly  three  hundred  thousand  less  than  the 
aggregated  vote  of  his  competitors.  In  his 
very  inaugural,  Buchanan  showed  his  complete 
ownership  by  the  slave  power,  foreshadowing 
the  **  Dred  Scott"  decision,  which  denied  the 
right  of  Congress  to  prohibit  slaveholding  in 
the  Territories. 

Meanwhile,  the  contest  in  Kansas  was  fight- 
ing itself  out.  The  genuine  colonists  were  al- 
most entirely  in  favor  of  free  labor  ;  but  there 
were  special  colonies  sent  from  the  Free  States 
(particularly  through  the  agency  of  the  Hon.  Eli 
Thayer)  for  the  purpose  of  securing  that  result, 
and  there  entered  bands  of  armed  Missourians, 
especially  at  election  time,  to  seize  the  political 
power  and  create  a  reign  of  terror.  Not  being 
able  to  so  intimidate  the  sturdy  settlers,  these 
latter  elected  a  Convention  in  1857,  ^^^  framed 
a  pro-slavery  constitution  known  as  the  **  Le- 
compton"  Constitution,  from  the  place  of  its 
birth.  There  were  then  two  nominal  govern- 
ments in  the  Territory.  The  President,  from 
fear  of  breaking  with  his  party,  was  forced  into 
endorsing  this  scheme  of  force  and  fraud.  But 
Stephen  A.  Douglas  now  saw  that  he  could 
go  no  further  without  alienating  the  great  bulk 
of  his  party  in  the  North,  and  destroying  all 
hope  of  further    political   advancement.     He 


226  HORACE   GREELEY. 

had,  moreover,  so  committed  himself  to  "  pop- 
ular sovereignty"  by  his  Kansas-Nebraska  Bill, 
that  he  knew  he  would  be  despised  of  all  men 
if  he  now  advocated  anything  but  a  genuine 
decision  by  flie  people.  The  "  Little  Giant" 
was  able,  in  a  strongly  pro-slavery  and  Demo- 
cratic House,  to  indirectly  defeat  the  Lecomp- 
ton  Constitution  by  a  measure  allowing  the 
people  to  vote  to  reject  it,  which  they  did  by 
an  overwhelming  majority. 

When  Mr.  Douglas  came  up  for  re-election 
at  the  close  of  this  Congress,  Mr.  Greeley 
urged  the  Republicans  of  Illinois  to  accept  him 
as  their  candidate,  and  insure  his  return  for  a 
third  senatorial  term.  What  would  have  been 
the  changed  result  of  this  course  in  the  subse- 
quent history  of  our  country,  it  is  not  easy  to 
conjecture,  though  Mr.  Greeley,  as  late  as  1868, 
still  "  abode"  in  the  conviction  that  it  would 
have  been  wiser.  Here  may  be  noted  the  first 
of  those  conspicuous  freaks  of  political  judg- 
ment which  culminated  in  the  final  and  tragic 
scene  of  his  career.  The  Republicans  of  Illi- 
nois, probably  knowing  Stephen  Arnold  Doug- 
las better  than  the  editor  of  the  New  York  Trib- 
une, and  holding  plain  and  honest  Abraham 
Lincoln  nearest  to  their  hearts,  of  all  men, 
nominated  the  latter,  and  sent  him  over  the 
State  debating  with  Douglas  before  the  thou- 
sands of  the  people,  the  issues  which  lay  before 


THE   POLITICIAN.  22/ 

the  country.  The  tournament  was  followed  by 
the  whole  land  with  eager  interest,  and,  though 
Douglas  was  elected  Senator  by  a  small  legis- 
lative majority,  a  general  attention  was  attract- 
ed to  Lincoln  as  the  powerful  and  popular 
champion  of  the  Free-Soil  cause. 

The  Republican  Convention  of  i860  turned 
upon  the  question  of  Seward  and  not  Seward. 
The  Senator  of  New  York  had  so  grown  upon 
the  people  as  a  leader  in  the  forum  and  in 
council,  that  a  large  plurality  of  the  delegates 
were  instructed  to  vote  in  his  favor.  Quite  a 
number  who  had  once,  in  opposition  to  Mr. 
Greeley's  ardent  electioneering  in  his  behalf, 
pronounced  his  nomination  unadvisable,  were 
now  urging  him  upon  the  Convention.  How 
much  Greeley's  break  with  Seward  had  to 
do  with  his  present  attitude  of  antagonism  and 
change  of  opinion  as  to  "  the  Governor's" 
availability,  we  may  not  conjecture.  We  only 
know  that  he  became  a  delegate  through  a 
commission  from  Oregon,  was  indefatigable  in 
his  efforts  to  defeat  the  nomination  of  Seward, 
visiting  and  addressing  various  delegations  with 
this  object.  He  always  afterward  deprecated 
the  credit  of  having  done  as  much  toward  the 
result  as  was  popularly  supposed.  His  own 
candidate  was  Edward  Bates  of  Missouri.  The 
uppermost  thought  in  the  minds  of  the  dele- 


228  HORACE   GREELEY. 

gates,  who  did  not  come  there  expressly  to  ob- 
tain Seward's  nomination,  was  to  ascertain 
which  of  the  other  candidates  could  best  unite 
the  opposition.  This  consolidation  was  only 
partially  accomplished  before  the  balloting — 
Seward  having  i/si,  Lincoln  102,  Simon  Cam- 
eron 50^,  Chase  49,  Bates  48,  and  Dayton,  Mc- 
Lean, and  CoUamer  each  a  few.  But  by  the 
third  ballot  three  of  these  had  been  withdrawn 
and  the  votes  of  others  greatly  reduced,  while 
Mr.  Seward's  had  only  grown  to  1 80.  The  votes 
had  gone  to  Lincoln,  who  received  231!^,  only 
four  or  five  less  than  a  majority,  whereupon 
the  usual  stampede  began,  and  votes  were 
transferred  to  Lincoln,  till  he  had  354  out  of 
466.  The  nomination  was  made  unanimous, 
though  we  have  reason  to  believe  that  Mr. 
Greeley  voted  for  Bates  up  to  this  time,  and 
was  never  in  his  heart  content  with  the  result. 
There  was  very  apparent  in  this  obstinate 
choice,  the  idea,  which  was  already  taking  such 
an  almost  morbid  hold  upon  him,  of  the  win- 
ning over  of  a  Southern  constituency  to  the 
new  party  by  a  selection  "  more  far-sighted, 
more  courageous,  and  more  magnanimous." 
He  shrank  from  the  appeal  to  stones,  and 
thought  that  the  day  of  throwing  grass  had  not 
yet  passed  by. 

The    canvass   of    the    Convention    by    Mr. 
Seward's  friends  was  undoubtedly  prejudicial 


THE  POLITICIAN.  229 

to  his  cause.  It  was  not  a  time  for  clap-trap 
or  of  intimidation  ;  and  the  appearance  of 
"gangs"  from  New  York,  processions,  drum- 
beating,  and  banner-flying  was  calculated  only 
to  prejudice  the  earnest  men  of  that  steel-toned 
time  ;  and  it  was  unnecessary  in  the  case  of  a 
man  whose  record  and  services  had  been  such 
as  William  H.  Seward's.  We  have  had  it  dis- 
tinctly stated  to  us  by  delegates  and  visitors  at 
Chicago,  that  it  was  not  so  much  Mr.  Seward 
who  was  defeated  as  it  was  the  men  who  lob- 
bied and  bullied  and  hurrahed  for  him,  and 
who,  it  was  feared,  would  represent  him  in  the 
Government.  The  effect  of  his  disappoint- 
ment was  very  bitter  to  the  distinguished 
candidate,  who  looked  upon  this  as  his  "  last 
chance"  for  the  Presidency,  and  regarded  him- 
self as  having  a  superior  claim  upon  the  party 
above  all  others. 

It  is  no  wonder,  then,  that  Mr.  Henry  J. 
Raymond  should  have  written  from  the  ex- 
Governor's  house  at  Auburn,  on  his  way  home, 
a  letter  to  his  paper,  the  New  York  Times,  in 
which  he  attributed  the  result  entirely  to  Mr. 
Greeley*s  influence  and  efforts,  and  at  the  same 
time  imputed  those  efforts  to  a  "personal 
hatred,  secretly  cherished  for  years,"  and  "  the 
long-hoarded  revenge  of  a  disappointed  office- 
seeker  ;"  and  again,  attributed  the  efficacy  of 
these  efforts  to   "the  forbearance"  of  those 


230  HORACE   GREELEY. 

who  knew  that  Greeley  had  written  a  letter  in 
November,  1854,  **  repudiating  all  further 
political  friendship"  for  Seward,  and  "  men- 
acing him  with  his  hostility  whenever  it  could 
be  made  most  effective,  for  the  avowed  reason 
that  Governor  Seward  had  never  aided  or  ad- 
vised his  elevation  to  office,"  etc.  Mr.  Ray- 
mond, notwithstanding  his  crediting  of  the  de- 
feat to  Mr.  Greeley,  admits  that  **  the  tre- 
mendous applause"  which  greeted  the  first 
mention  of  Lincoln's  name  was  an  indication 
of  extraordinary  enthusiasm  and  unanimity, 
and  declares  that  "  the  final  selection  of  Lincoln 
was  a  matter  of  accident."  His  whole  tone  is 
one  of  intense  bitterness  and  sarcasm,  and  ar- 
raigns the  editor  of  the  7>z"Z'//;/r  for  unjustifiable 
inconsistency  with  his  own  past  record,  and 
for  the  most  malignant  and  contemptible  of 
motives. 

Mr.  Greeley  made  an  immediate  demand 
for  the  letter  referred  to,  for  publication 
in  his  paper.  We  shall  have  another  oppor- 
tunity of  adducing  the  substance  of  this  let- 
ter under  another  chapter  of  this  book.  In 
commenting  upon  it,  he  asseverates  what 
we  think  few  will  nowadays  doubt  :  "  If  ever 
in  my  life  I  discharged  a  public  duty  in  utter 
disregard  of  personal  considerations,  I  did  so 
at  Chicago  last  month.  I  was  no  longer  a  de- 
votee of  Governor  Seward,  but  I  was  equally 


THE   POLITICIAN.  23 1 

independent  of  all  others  ;  and  if  I  had  been 
swayed  by  feeling  alone,  I  should,  for  many 
reasons,  have  preferred  him  to  any  of  his  com- 
petitors. .  .  .  But  I  did  not,  and  do  not,  be- 
lieve it  advisable  that  he  should  be  the  Re- 
publican candidate  for  President  ;  and  .  .  . 
each  subsequent  day's  developments  have 
tended  to  strengthen  my  confidence  that  what 
I  did  was  not  only  well  meant,  but  well 
done." 

Subsequent  developments,  we  may  add,  have 
abundantly  accounted  for  Mr.  Greeley's  course 
in  the  Chicago  Convention,  and  in  all  his  re- 
maining political  life,  upon  the  broader  basis 
of  a  (perhaps)  mistaken  policy  toward  the 
South,  without  imputing  to  him  the  ignomin- 
ious motive  of  personal  revenge. 

The  election  of  the  Chicago  candidate,  who- 
ever he  might  be,  was  a  foregone  conclusion. 
The  Democratic  Convention  at  Charleston 
had  broken  up  in  a  quarrel  by  the  withdrawal 
of  a  majority  of  the  delegates  from  Slave 
States,  who  could  not  accept  the  "  Squatter 
Sovereignty"  platform  adopted, — the  bolters 
nominating  Vice-President  John  C.  Breckin- 
ridge for  President.  The  remainder  or  regular 
Convention  nominated  Stephen  A.  Douglas. 
John  Bell  of  Tennessee  and  Edward  Everett 
had    also   been    put    in    nomination    by    the 


232  HORACE   GREELEY. 

"  American,"  or  (as  it  was  now  called)  "  The 
Constitutional  Union"  party,  an  indefinite 
movement  calculated  to  draw  votes  from  the 
Democrats  rather  than  the  Republicans. 
There  can  be  no  question  now  that  the  South- 
ern leaders  of  the  Breckinridge  party  meant  to 
secure  a  Republican  victory,  as  a  pretext  for, 
and  a  step  forward  in  the  line  of,  disunion. 
The  result  was  that  Lincoln  carried  180  elec- 
toral votes  to  123  for  all  others,  receiving  all 
from  the  free  States,  except  4  in  New  Jersey, 
which  went  to  Douglas.  The  popular  vote 
gave  Lincoln  1,857,610,  Douglas  1,291,574, 
Breckinridge  850,082,  and  Bell  646,121.  This 
result  was  received  with  special  rejoicings  in 
South  Carolina. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  North  became 
alarmed  by  a  sudden  realization  of  a  possible 
secession  ;  and  the  compromise  and  cringing 
were  revived.  The  Crittenden  Compromise — 
proposing  to  divide  up  forever  the  Territories 
all  the  way  to  the  Pacific,  by  the  line  of  36  de- 
grees and  30  minutes,  between  slavery  and 
freedom — Mr.  Greeley  thinks  would  have  car- 
ried the  popular  vote  of  the  North.  His  own 
position  now  became  more  and  more  singular 
and  speculative.  He  stood  firm  in  his  deter- 
mination to  yield  not  a  jot  to  slavery  extension, 
as  a  worse  evil  than  disunion,  inasmuch  as  the 
one   was  "  guilt,"  and  the  other  "  calamity." 


THE   POLITICIAN.  233 

But,  estimating  the  real  secession  sentiment  to 
be  limited  to  the  Breckinridge  vote,  he  had  an 
optimistic  view  that  the  remainder  of  the 
Southern  people  were  open  to  reason,  and 
would  shrink  from  a  dissolution  of  the  Union 
as  the  worse  evil.  His  policy,  therefore,  was 
to  boldly  confront  the  comparatively  small 
body  of  extremists  with  an  attitude  like  this  : 
We  are  tired  and  impatient  of  your  threats  of 
disunion  ;  it  is  time  to  end  it  ;  we  want  you 
distinctly  to  understand  that  "  the  Union  was 
no  boon  conferred  on  the  North  by  the  South, 
but  a  vohintary  partnership,  at  least  as  advan- 
tageous to  the  latter  as  to  the  former,"  and 
'*  that  the  North  can  do  without  the  South 
quite  as  well  as  the  South  could  do  without  the 
North." 

While  the  great  leaders  of  the  Northern 
sentiment  were  saying  to  the  South  :  The 
Union  cannot  be  dissolved  by  force,  and  who- 
ever attempts  it  will  rue  the  day  ;  behave  your- 
selves, and  obey  the  laws, — Horace  Greeley  took 
this  stand  :  "  You  are  not  the  Southern  peo- 
ple, nor  even  a  majority  of  the  Southern  whites, 
but  an  unscrupulous  and  desperate  minority 
who  have  overawed,  gagged,  and  paralyzed  the 
majority.  Secure  us  a  fair  opportunity  to  state 
our  side  of  the  case,  and  to  argue  the  points  at 
issue  before  your  people,  and  we  will  abide 
their  decision."     And  then  he  adds  these  un- 


234  HORACE   GREELEY. 

fortunate  words  (remember  that  this  was  be- 
fore the  war,  and  even  before  the  new  Admin- 
istration had  been  inaugurated)  :  "  We  disclaim 
a  union  of  force, — a  union  held  together  by 
bayonets.  ...  If  your  people  decide  that 
they  choose  to  break  away  from  us,  we  will  in- 
terpose no  obstacle  to  their  peaceful  withdrawal 
from  the  Union." 

The  above  he  gives  as  what  he  "  said  in  sub- 
stance." Here  is  what  he  said  in  actuality  and 
cold  type  :  "  The  dissolution  of  the  Union 
would  not  be  the  dreadful  affair  he  [a  corre- 
spondent] represents  it.  It  would  be  a  very 
absurd  act  on  the  part  of  the  seceding  party, 
and  would  work  great  inconvenience  and  em- 
barrassment, especially  to  the  people  of  the 
great  Mississippi  Valley.  In  time,  however, 
matters  would  accommodate  themselves  to  the 
new  political  arrangements,  and  we  should  grow 
as  many  bushels  of  corn  to  the  acre,  and  get  as 
many  yards  of  cloth  from  a  hundred  pounds  of 
wool  as  we  now  do.  The  Union  is  an  excel- 
lent thing — quite  too  advantageous  to  be 
broken  up  in  an  age  so  utilitarian  as  this  ;  but 
it  is  possible  to  exaggerate  even  its  blessings." 
It  was  a  strange  perversion  of  judgment  which 
led  him  to  suppose  that  this  kind  of  talk  would 
tend  to  discourage  disunion.  And  have  we 
not  here  a  glimpse  of  another  of  Mr.  Greeley's 
weaknesses,  a  tendency  to  utilitarian  estimates 


THE   POLITICIAN.  235 

of»  ethical  and  aesthetic  subjects  ?  It  would 
seem  as  if  in  farming  he  was  a  theorist,  while 
in  the  realm  of  ideas  he  was  too  apt  to  look  to 
crops  of  corn  and  pounds  of  wool. 

He  was  right  in  believing  that  the  South  was 
not  yet  for  secession  ;  but  this  was  simply  be- 
cause the  crucial  hour,  when  the  secrets  of  all 
men's  hearts  were  to  be  revealed,  had  not  come. 
He  attributed  the  final  union  of  the  South  in 
disunion,  to  the  bombardment  of  Sumter,  and 
quotes  ex-Senator  Clemens  of  Alabama  as 
testifying  to  having  overheard  some  of  the  Con- 
federate leaders,  soon  after  the  ordinance  of 
secession  was  passed,  discussing  the  propriety 
of  firing  on  that  fortress,  and  saying  to  one 
another  :  "  //  MUST  ^^  done  ;  delay  two  months y 
and  Alabama  stays  in  tJie  Union ;  y on  must 
sprinkle  blood  in  tJie  faces  of  the  people.''  But 
Greeley's  error  was  in  not  taking  just  this  con- 
tingency into  account  as  sure  to  be  the  course 
of  those  desperate  "  Rebs,"  and  also  in  failing 
to  fathom  the  latent  depth  of  the  State  Rights 
and  State  loyalty  principle  to  which  their  vio- 
lent measures  would  appeal.  This  singular 
misconception  of  the  nature  of  the  Union,  and 
still  more  singular  illusion  as  to  the  Southern 
people,  furnish  the  sufficient  clew  to  the  mys- 
teries and  mistakes  of  his  subsequent  ca- 
reer. 

Many  of  us  who  were  then  readers  of  the 


236  HORACE   GREELEY, 

Tribune  can  well  remember  the  snock  whith 
such  opinions,  and  the  following,  gave  us,  and 
possibly  the  temporary  warping  of  our  own 
views  of  the  indissolubility  of  the  Union,  and 
of  the  real  nature  of  the  situation  confronting 
us, — so  much  easier  is  it  to  judge  of  a  matter 
by  a  look-back  than  by  a  forecast  :  "  If  seven 
or  eight  contiguous  States  shall  present  them- 
selves authentically  at  Washington,  saying, 
*  We  hate  the  Federal  Union,  we  have  with- 
drawn from  it  ;  we  give  you  the  choice  be- 
tween acquiescing  in  our  secession  and  arrang- 
ing amicably  all  incidental  questions  on  the  one 
hand,  and  attempting  to  subdue  us  on  the 
other,'  we  could  not  stand  up  for  coercion,  for 
subjugation,  for  we  do  not  think  it  just.  .  .  . 
While  we  deny  the  right  of  slaveholders  to  hold 
slaves  against  the  will  of  the  latter,  we  cannot 
see  how  twenty  millions  can  rightfully  hold  ten 
or  even  five  in  a  detested  union  with  them  by 
military  force.  .  .  .  We  could  not  take  the 
other  side  without  coming  in  direct  conflict 
with  those  rights  of  man  which  we  hold  para- 
mount to  all  political  arrangements,  however 
convenient  and  advantageous."  These  words 
were  printed  as  early  as  December  17th,  i860  ; 
and  a  week  afterward  these  :  "  Let  the  cotton 
States,  or  any  six  or  more  States,  say  unequivo- 
cally, *  We  want  to  get  out  of  the  Union,'  and 
propose  to  effect  their  end  peaceably  and  in- 


THE    POLITICIAN.  237 

offensively,  and  we  will  do  our  best  to  help 
them  out  ;  not  that  we  want  them  to  go,  but 
that  we  loathe  the  idea  of  compelling  them  to 
stay.  All  we  ask  is  that  they  exercise  a  rea- 
sonable patience,  so  as  to  give  time  for  effect- 
ing their  end  without  bloodshed." 

Let  us  bear  in  mind,  while  reading  such 
manifestoes,  as  well  as  in  Horace  Greeley's 
whole  career,  that  there  lay  at  the  basis  of  his 
moral  and  mental  make-up  (probably  uncon- 
scious to  himself)  two  great  principles,  or  senti- 
ments,— an  almost  fanatical  passion  for  liberty 
to  all  and  in  all  things,  and  a  morbid  shrinking 
from  the  employment  of  physical  force,  and 
especially  bloodshed,  even  toward  criminals 
convicted  of  murder. 

Yet  with  characteristic  inconsistency  we  find 
him  saying  at  th^  same  date  as  the  language 
just  quoted  :  "  I  deny  to  one  State,  or  to  a  dozen 
different  States,  the  right  to  dissolve  this 
Union.  It  can  only  be  legally  dissolved  as  it 
was  formed — by  the  free  consent  of  all  the 
parties  concerned.  ...  It  is  anarchy  even  to 
admit  the  right  of  secession.  It  is  to  degrade 
our  Union  into  a  mere  alliance,  and  insure  its 
speedy  ruin."  It  is  difficult  to  understand 
that  such  diverse  teachings  could  proceed  from 
a  perfectly  sound  condition  of  brain.  It  cer- 
tainly indicates,  if  not  a  mental  confusion,  a 
tendency  for  the  mind,  in  the  face  of  a  great 


238  HORACE   GREELEY. 

crisis,  to  be  thrown  into  an  indecisive  and  spec- 
ulative train,  rather  than  to  be  braced  for  the 
clear  apprehension  of  the  situation,  and  a 
corresponding  promptness  and  firmness  of  ac- 
tion. 


CHAPTER   XV. 

THE   POLITICIAN  :    THE   CIVIL  WAR. 

The  war  was  really  going  on  in  the  South, 
even  before  Mr.  Lincoln's  inauguration.  Every 
fortress,  arsenal,  and  armory  of  the  Federal 
Government,  except  three,  had  been  handed 
over  without  resistance  to  the  conspirators  ; 
and  the  greater  part  of  our  small  army,  with 
all  its  equipments  and  stores,  had  been  sur- 
rendered by  General  Twiggs,  who  would  seem 
to  have  been  purposely  assigned  by  the  Secre- 
tary of  War  to  the  Southwestern  frontier  for 
that  very  purpose.  But  somehow  the  actual 
existence  of  armed  rebellion  was  not  realized 
by  the  people  of  the  North  till  the  tidings  came 
like  a  thunder-clap  that  Fort  Sumter  had  been 
fired  upon,  and  had  surrendered  on  the  I2th  and 
13th  of  April.  The  immediate  result  of  this, 
as  had  been  anticipated,  was  the  hurrying  of 
States  which  Mr.  Greeley  had  hoped  to  save 
by  reasoning  (such  as  Virginia,  North  Caro- 
lina, Tennessee,  and  others)  into  rebellion  and 
affiliation  with  the  original  seven. 

We  need   not  recite  the  rapid  strides  of  the 
Rebellion, — the  assaults  upon  our  troops  pass- 


240  HORACE   GREELEY. 

ing  through  Baltimore  by  pro-slavery  mobs  ; 
the  abandonment  of  Harper's  Ferry  Arsenal  and 
of  Norfolk  Navy-Yard  under  fire  ;  the  menac- 
ing of  St.  Louis  by  a  Confederate  camp  ;  the 
expectation  of  winning  "  Maryland,  my  Mary- 
land" to  the  disunion  cause  ;  the  closing  of 
the  South  to  Northern  travel  and  commerce. 
Nor  need  we  repeat  President  Lincoln's  call  to 
arms,  and  summons  of  the  new  Congress  to 
meet  on  July  4th,  and  the  response  of  the 
War  Governors  of  the  free  States  with  their 
quotas  of  troops  to  protect  the  capital  and 
property  of  the  Union. 

Just  here  begins  the  fire  of  criticisms,  as  con- 
stant as  they  were  inconsistent,  with  which 
Horace  Greeley's  Tribune  kept  up  a  side  bom- 
bardment of  the  Government.  He  first  cen- 
sured the  President  for  calling  out  75,000  men 
instead  of  1,000,000.  The  second  was  to  de- 
nounce the  "  weakness,  irresolution,  hesitation, 
delay,"  in  its  councils,  and  the  scattering  of 
its  recruits,  "  demoralized  by  weeks  of  idleness 
and  dissipation,"  on  separate  lines,  till  the 
enemy  had  collected  all  his  forces  against  a 
single  corps  of  ours  at  Bull  Run,  defeating  and 
stampeding  it. 

At  the  same  time,  Mr.  Greeley  could  not 
deny  that  the  "  Forward  to  Richmond  !"  im- 
pulse had  been  stimulated  by  his  paper,  though 
it  "  was  not  in  accordance  with  the  views  and 


THE   POLITICIAN.  24I 

advice  which  he  had  profusely  and  almost  daily- 
proffered  !"  It  was  the  cause  of  profound  and 
prolonged  distress  to  him,  and  even  of  an  at- 
tack of  brain-fever,  which  for  weeks  rendered 
him  prostrate  and  almost  unconscious.  He  in- 
sisted, however,  upon  exculpating  himself  from 
any  responsibility  for  a  movement  such  as  this 
had  been,  and  still  declared  his  belief  that  a 
hundred  thousand  men,  if  earlier  started,  might 
have  been  in  the  rebel  capital  on  or  before  July 
20th  (the  date  of  the  battle  of  Bull  Run). 

The  disaster,  and  the  disposition  of  the  coun- 
try to  make  a  scapegoat  of  him  for  voicing 
the  popular  impatience  and  ignorance,  made 
him  thereafter  less  peremptory  in  his  advice, 
though  not  more  diffident.  He  found  it  quite 
impossible  to  carry  out  his  pledge  to  "  bar  all 
criticism  in  these  columns  on  army  movements, 
past  or  future."  Even  in  saying  this,  he  took 
pains  to  emphasize  anew  his  leading  maxim  and 
criticism  :  "  I  think  a  government  that  begins 
the  work  of  putting  down  a  rebellion  by  form- 
ing *  camps  of  instruction'  "  (note  the  incon- 
sistency of  this  with  his  censure  of  the  Admin- 
istration for  not  comprehending  the  proportions 
and  premonitions  of  the  Rebellion),  "  or  any- 
thing of  that  sort,  is  likely  to  make  a  long  job 
of  it.  .  .  .  I  beg  it  to  be  understood  once  for 
all,  that  if  less  than  half  the  Union  armies  are 
hurled  against  all  the  rebel  forces  that  could 


242  HORACE   GREELEY. 

be  concentrated  (more  than  double  their  num- 
ber), on  ground  strongly  fortified  by  the  trai- 
tors, the  Tribune  does  not  approve  and  should 
not  be  held  responsible  for  such  madness.  .  .  . 
Say  what  you  will  of  the  past,  but  remember 
this  for  the  future." 

It  is  difficult  to  be  patient  with  such  inconsis- 
tent criticism  on  the  part  of  a  great  organ  of  pub- 
He  opinion,  so  unfair  and  embarrassing  to  an  Ad- 
ministration charged  with  the  greatest  military 
work  of  modern  times  without  preparation  or 
experience  ;  but  it  must  be  considered  with  re- 
gard to  the  source  from  which  it  came, — a  man 
whose  nature  and  whose  occupation  had  com- 
bined to  endue  him  with  a  sense  of  his  own  in- 
fallibility, and  his  duty  to  pronounce  instan- 
taneous judgment  on  all  the  world's  affairs  be- 
tween midnight  and  dawn,  and  a  man  of 
intensity  of  moral  and  nervous  temperament, 
which  could  not  brook  the  least  delay  or  differ- 
ence in  the  doing  of  his  will.  Yet  we  presume 
that  no  one  would  venture  now  to  impugn  his 
singleness  and  integrity  of  motive  in  all  his 
long  and  inconsiderate  opposition  to  the  Ad- 
ministration. 

His  next  assumption  of  special  wisdom  and 
special  responsibility  appeared  in  August,  1862, 
after  General  McClellan's  retreat  from  the 
Peninsula,  in  the  form  of  a  demand  (styled 
"The   Prayer  of  Twenty  Millions")  that  the 


THE   POLITICIAN.  243 

President  should  proclaim  liberty  to  the  slaves 
under  the  Confiscation  Act.  Mr.  Lincoln 
thought  best  to  reply  in  the  same  public  man- 
ner, and  his  letter  is  one  of  those  gems  of  clear, 
concise,  and  apothegmatic  style  which  have 
given  him  a  place  beside  Patrick  Henry  and 
Daniel  Webster  among  our  public  men.  He 
begins  by  waiving  any  attempt  to  contravert, 
or  to  defend  himself  against,  any  erroneous  as- 
sumptions and  inferences  or  any  impatient  and 
dictatorial  tone  which  it  might  contain,  **  in 
deference  to  an  old  friend  whose  heart  I  have 
always  found  to  be  right."  He  then  proclaims 
his  "  paramount  object  to  save  the  Union,  and 
not  either  to  save  or  destroy  slavery.  If  I 
could  save  the  Union  without  freeing  any  slave, 
I  would  do  it  ;  if  I  could  do  it  by  freeing  all 
the  slaves,  I  would  do  it  ;  and  if  I  could  do  it 
by  freeing  some  and  leaving  others  alone,  I 
would  also  do  that.  What  I  do  about  slavery 
and  the  colored  race,  I  do  because  I  believe  it 
helps  save  this  Union  ;  and  what  I  forbear,  I 
forbear  because  I  do  not  believe  it  would  help 
to  save  the  Union.  I  shall  do  less  whenever 
I  shall  believe  what  I  am  doing  hurts  the  cause  ; 
and  I  shall  do  more  whenever  I  shall  believe 
doing  more  will  help  the  cause.  I  shall  try  to 
correct  errors  when  shown  to  be  errors,  and  I 
shall  adopt  nev/  views  so  fast  as  they  shall  ap- 
pear to  be  true  views.     I  have  here  stated  my 


244  HORACE   GREELEY. 

purpose,  according  to  my  view  of  official  duty  ; 
and  I  intend  no  modification  of  my  personal 
wish  that  all  men  everywhere  should  be  free." 
Mr.  Greeley's  reply  consisted  in  reasserting  his 
opinion  that  the  rebels  had  actually  and  legally 
forfeited  all  property  rights  (which  his  corre- 
spondent recognized  as  well  as  himself),  sum- 
marizing conspicuous  instances  of  weak  and  in- 
consistent action,  such  as  the  modification  of 
Fremont's  proclamation,  and  the  reluctant  and 
even  outrageous  treatment  by  the  soldiers  of 
fugitives  who  had  fled  for  shelter  within  our 
lines  ;  and  pointing  to  the  policy  of  doing  just 
that  which  the  enemies  of  the  cause.  North  and 
South,  did  not  want  us  to  do. 

As  we  have  intimated,  the  weakness,  if  not 
the  impertinence,  of  Mr.  Greeley  was  in  not  ap- 
prehending all  these  generalities  of  policy,  and 
in  urging  the  President  to  take  this  extreme 
measure,  when  (of  all  times)  our  cause  looked 
its  darkest,  and  we  were  cowering  under  a 
crushing  defeat  and  disappointment.  How 
much  wiser  did  our  Fabius  show  himself  to  be, 
in  waiting  a  month  longer  for  the  great  victory 
of  Antietam  to  give  his  Proclamation  of  Eman- 
cipation the  prestige  of  power  rather  than  the 
tone  of  a  shriek  of  despair  ! 

It  was  only  a  few  days  after  this  decree  went 
into  effect  (January  22d,  1863)  that  we  find  the 
Tribune  apparently  dissatisfied  with  the  execu- 


THE   POLITICIAN.  245 

tion  of  its  great  gun,  which  it  had  confidently 
expected  to  dash  the  Confederacy  in  pieces  by 
its  mere  reverberation,  and  talking  in  this 
wise  :  "  If  three  months  more  of  earnest  fight- 
ing shall  not  serve  to  make  a  serious  impres- 
sion upon  the  rebels  ;  if  the  end  of  that  term 
shall  find  us  no  further  advanced  than  its  be- 
ginning, ...  let  us  bow  to  our  destiny,  and 
make  the  best  attainable  peace. "  About  this 
time  also  (December,  1862),  knowing  their 
man,  the  enemy  began  to  entice  him  through 
their  agents  to  endeavors-  for  peace,  with  a 
view  to  using  these  for  bolstering  up  the  cour- 
age of  their  followers.  But  this  time,  however 
anxious  to  contribute  to  the  end,  he  was  not 
to  be  led  into  a  snare  as  to  the  means.  His 
letter  to  Mr.  W.  C.  (Colorado)  Jewett,  of 
Washington,  gave  distinct  notice  that  the  ne- 
gotiations must  not  be  between  unofficial  per- 
sons, but  "  between  the  Government  of  the 
United  States  and  the  accredited  authorities 
of  the  Confederates  ;"  that  the  Confederates 
must  take  the  initiative  ;  and  that  any  arbitra- 
tion proposed  must  exclude  Great  Britain, 
France,  and  Louis  Napoleon,  and  must  be 
**  a  power  which  has  evinced  no  partiality 
or  unfriendliness  to  either  party."  "  I  can 
consider  no  man  a  friend  of  the  Union," 
were  his  concluding  words,  **  who  makes  a 
parade  of  peace  propositions,  or  peace  agita- 


246  HORACE   GREELEY. 

tion,  prior  to  such  action."  The  result  was, 
of  course,  the  discovery  once  more  by  Mr. 
Greeley,  *'  after  weeks  of  earnest  pursuit  of 
some  endurable  peace  proposition  from  the 
rebels,  without  having  come  in  sight  of  any 
rebel  proposition  at  all,"  "  that  there  never 
was  any  conciliatory  project  authorized  by 
the  rebel  chiefs."  Is  there  not  something 
to  be  more  compassionated  than  censured  in 
the  almost  infantile  innocence  and  incorrigible 
fatuity  of  such  a  chase  of  rainbows  as  this,  and 
his  whole  career  to  the  end  7 

Again,  in  July,  1864,  we  find  Horace  Greeley 
in  correspondence  with  Jewett  and  others,  at 
Niagara  Falls,  who  seemed  to  have  given  him 
an  impression,  and  induced  him  to  give  the 
President  an  impression,  that  they  were  empow- 
ered to  negotiate  for  peace.  Among  the  rea- 
sons impelling  Mr.  Greeley  to  rush  with  anxious 
eacrerness  into  the  conference  is  this  character- 
istic  one,  — "  the  fearful  expensiveness  of  the 
war"  and  that  to  protract  it  was  to  "'  involve 
all  parties  in  bankruptcy  and  ruin."  By  per- 
sistent endeavor  he  obtained  a  roving  commis- 
sion from  the  President  to  this  efTect  :  "  If  you 
can  find  any  person,  anywhere,  professing  to  have 
any  proposition  from  Jefferson  Davis,  in  writ- 
ing, for  peace,  embracing  the  restoration  of  the 
Union  and  abandonment  of  slavery,  whatever 
else  it  embraces,  say  to  him  that  he  may  come 


THE   POLITICIAN.  247 

to  me  with  you,  and  that  if  he  really  brings  any 
such  proposition  he  shall  at  least  have  safe  con- 
duct with  the  paper  (and  without  publicity,  if 
he  chooses)  to  the  point  where  you  shall  have 
met  with  him.  The  same,  if  there  be  two  or 
more  persons."  This  was  in  answer  to  a  **  be- 
seeching request"  that  the  President  should 
*'  not  fail  to  make  the  Southern  people  com- 
prehend that  you  and  all  of  us  are  anxious  for 
peace,  and  prepared  to  grant  liberal  terms." 
Mr.  Greeley  then  "  ventures  to  suggest"  his 
own  "  Plan  of  Adjustment,"  the  principal 
points  of  which  were  of  the  most  visionary  and 
impracticable  character  :  a  restored  and  per- 
petual Union  ;  the  utter  and  perpetual  abol- 
ishment of  slavery  ;  complete  amnesty  for  all 
political  offences,  and  the  restoration  of  citi- 
zenship to  all  ;  a  grant  of  §400,000,000  to  the 
slave  States,  in  compensation  for  the  losses  of 
their  loyal  citizens  by  the  abolition  of  slavery  ; 
the  representation  of  those  States  in  the  House 
hereafter  **  on  the  basis  of  their  total,  instead 
of  their  Federal,  population  ;"  a  National 
Convention  "  to  ratify  this  adjustment  and 
make  such  changes  in  the  Constitution  as  may 
be  deemed  advisable." 

The  outcome  of  the  conference  between  Mr. 
Greeley  and  the  gentlemen  at  Niagara,  who 
had  purported  to  be  peace  commissioners, 
amounted  to  the  following,  the  whole  scheme 


248  HORACE   GREELEY. 

being  circumvented  by  Mr.  Lincoln's  charac- 
teristically adroit  management  :  First,  the 
Southerners  repudiated  their  being  "  accredited 
as  the  bearers  of  propositions  looking  to  the 
establishment  of  peace,"  but  offered  to  obtain 
such  on  being  allowed  a  safeguard  to  Rich- 
mond and  thence  to  Washington,  —  which  was 
granted.  Second,  the  issue  of  a  paper  from 
the  President,  addressed  "  To  whom  it  may 
concern,"  promising  to  "  receive  and  consider 
any  proposition  which  embraces  the  restoration 
of  peace,  the  integrity  of  the  whole  Union,  and 
the  abandonment  of  slavery,  and  which  comes 
by  and  with  an  authority  that  can  control  the 
armies  now  at  war  against  the  United  States." 
Third,  an  indignant  letter  published  by  the 
Niagara  conferees — who  only  thus  saw  their 
way  out  of  their  embarrassment  in  having  made 
false  pretences,  and  who  knew  that  the  "  safe- 
guard" would  profit  them  nothing  in  getting 
out  of  their  scrape — charging  the  President,  in 
the  language  of  his  proclamation,  with  decep- 
tion and  a  change  of  attitude  and  spirit.  They 
professed  to  have  heard  in  his  previous  com- 
munications no  hint  of  the  conditions  of  this 
manifesto,  but  that  they  were  animated  with  a 
spirit,  and  contained  a  proffer  of  "  uncondi- 
tioned negotiations,  which  would  not  compro- 
mise the  rights  or  the  dignity  of  either  Govern- 
ment."    All  of  which  means  either  that  they 


THE   POLITICIAN.  249 

lied,  or  that  Mr.  Greeley  concealed  what  he 
ought  to  have  brought  forward  at  the  beginning 
of  his  conference,  or  that  Mr.  Lincoln  did  in 
two  days  entirely  change  front.  We  think  the 
most  natural  solution  is  to  suppose  that  Mr. 
Greeley  had  been  so  exceedingly  diplomatic 
that  he  had  not  yet  come  to  that  stage  of  his 
ingenious  scheme. 

The  language  of  the  "  Commissioners"  was 
in  the  finest  style  of  Bombastes  Furioso.  To 
accept  the  offer  of  Mr.  Lincoln  was  equivalent 
to  submitting  to  terms  of  conquest,  and  "  the 
generation  was  yet  unborn  which  would  witness 
such  submission."  In  their  closing  words  is 
apparent  the  real  intent  of  their  pretended  de- 
sire for  negotiation,  and  of  their  attempt  to  use 
Horace  Greeley  as  a  convenient  tool.  They 
express  their  hope  that  "  this  correspondence 
will  not  prove  wholly  barren  of  good  result. 
If  there  is  any  citizen  of  the  Confederate  States 
who  has  clung  to  a  hope  that  peace  was  possi- 
ble with  this  Administration  of  the  Federal 
Government,  it  will  strip  from  his  eyes  the  last 
film  ;  or  if  there  be  any  whose  hearts  have 
grown  faint  under  the  suffering  and  agony  of 
this  bloody  struggle,  it  will  inspire  them  with 
fresh  energy  to  endure  and  brave  whatever  may 
yet  be  requisite  to  preserve  to  themselves  all 
that  gives  dignity  and  value  to  life,  or  hope 
and  consolation  to  death." 


250  HORACE   GREELEY. 

It  must  be  confessed  that  Mr.  Greeley,  in  his 
hysterical,  deluded,  and  Quixotic  course  in  this 
affair,  cuts  a  shabby  and  pitiable  figure.  Worse 
still,  we  miss  his  usual  frankness  and  straight- 
forwardness in  these  goings-between,  and  in  his 
statements  concerning  his  own  and  the  Presi- 
dent's understanding  in  the  matter.  And 
worse  than  all,  we  find  in  his  correspondence 
"with  Mr.  Lincoln,  after  the  affair  was  over 
(only  made  public  in  July  last  by  Colonel  John 
Hay,  who  was  the  President's  aide  in  these 
transactions),  a  disposition  to  defend  the  rebel 
commissioners  in  their  charge  that  the  Presi- 
dent had  acted  in  bad  faith  by  shifting  the 
conditions  of  negotiation.  He  also  bitterly 
reproaches  Mr.  Lincoln  for  the  whole  past,  and 
insists  upon  it  that  nine  tenths  of  the  whole 
American  people.  North  and  South,  are  sick 
of  slaughter  and  anxious  for  peace  on  almost 
any  terms  ;  that  a  peace  might  have  been  made 
last  month  by  "  an  honest,  sincere  effort,"  but 
it  was  now  doubtful.  If  it  could  not  be  ob- 
tained, he  implored  the  President  to  consent 
to  * '  an  armistice  for  one  ycar^  each  party  to 
retain  unmolested  all  it  now  holds,  but  the 
rebel  ports  to  be  opened.  .  .  .  Meantime,  let 
a  National  Convention  be  held,  and  there  will 
be  no  more  war,  at  all  events.'' 

Thus   was   Horace   Greeley  fooled   again  by 
the  enemy  whom  he  was  "  possessed"  to  con- 


THE    POLITICIAN.  2$  I 

fide  in,  and  thus  did  he,  in  his  over-anxiety, 
allow  himself  to  misrepresent  his  own  Govern- 
ment and  the  spirit  of  the  nation.  Thus  did 
he  also  fail  to  understand  the  peculiar  fitness 
and  genius  of  Abraham  Lincoln  for  the  crisis 
for  which  Providence  had  assigned  him,  as  a 
man  who  followed  closely  and  devoutly  the 
leadings  of  that  Providence,  as  indicated  by 
events  and  by  popular  sentiment, — a  man  who 
was  wise  enough  to  know  that  it  was  worse 
than  useless  to  advance  without  the  great  body 
of  "  the  plain  people"  behind  him,  and  who 
grew  up  into  the  knowledge  and  requirements 
of  the  war  as  it  developed  itself  both  North 
and  South.  Mr.  Greeley  tells  at  length,  in  his 
"  Recollections,"  Mr.  Lincoln's  well-known 
story  of  the  presiding  elder,  who  gave  only  one 
advice  in  regard  to  crossing  a  swollen  and  dan- 
gerous stream  in  Illinois  :  "  Oh,  yes,  I  know  all 
about  Fox  River  ;  I  have  crossed  it  often,  and 
understand  it  well.  But  I  have  one  fixed  rule 
with  regard  to  Fox  River  :  1  never  cross  it  till 
I  reach  it."  Mr.  Greeley,  by  the  way,  testifies 
in  reference  to  the  popular  impression  that 
Mr.  Lincoln  "  was  always  overflowing  with 
jocular  narrations  or  reminiscences,"  that,  dur- 
ing a  familiar  and  frequent  intimacy  of  more 
than  sixteen  years,  he  could  not  remember  to 
have  ever  heard  him  tell  a  single  one.  His 
singular  opinion  of  Lincoln  was,  that  he  was 


252  HORACE   GREELEY. 

**  most  inapt  for  the  leadership  of  a  people  in- 
volved in  desperate,  agonizing  war,"  but  emi- 
nently fitted  for  the  work  of  conciliation  and 
reconstruction,  from  which  he  was  snatched 
away,  to  the  woe  of  both  sections,  and  that 
"  his  true  career  was  just  opening  when  an  as- 
sassin's bullet  quenched  his  light  of  life."  We 
believe,  on  the  other  hand,  that  the  general 
opinion  of  the  people  was  that,  while  adapted 
for  the  latter  function,  the  hand  which  had 
wielded  the  thunderbolts  might  not  have  been 
as  successful  in  restoring  the  right  relations  be- 
tween the  Government  and  those  who  would 
regard  him  as  their  "  conqueror,"  and  that  he 
was  as  fortunate  in  death  as  in  life. 

Mr.  Greeley,  moreover,  thinks  that  the  bul- 
let of  Wilkes  Booth  only  anticipated,  by  a  short 
period,  the  end  of  his  career.  "  He  was  worn 
out,  and  would  not,  I  judge,  have  lived  out 
his  official  term,  had  no  one  sought  his  immo- 
lation. When  I  last  saw  him,  a  few  weeks  be- 
fore his  death,  I  was  struck  by  his  haggard, 
care-fraught  face,  so  different  from  the  sunny, 
gladsome  countenance  he  first  brought  from 
Illinois.  I  felt  that  his  life  hung  by  so  slender 
a  thread  that  any  new  access  of  trouble  or  ex- 
cess of  effort  might  suddenly  close  his  career. 
I  had  ceased  to  apprehend  his  assassination, — 
had  ceased  even  to  think  of  it  ;  yet  the  '  sun- 
set   of    life  *    was   plainly  looking   out  of   his 


THE   POLITICIAN.  253 

kindly  eyes,  and  gleaming  from  his  weather- 
beaten  visage."  Mr.  Greeley  seems  to  have 
had  some  inkling  at  the  last  that  this  was  a 
genuine  *'  man  of  destiny,"  like  the  prophet 
Samuel,  William  the  Silent,  and  Washington. 
"  I  sat  just  behind  him,"  he  says,  speaking  of 
the  first  inaugural  address,  "  expecting  to  hear 
its  delivery  arrested  by  the  crack  of  a  rifle 
aimed  at  his  heart  ;  but  it  pleased  God  to  post- 
pone the  deed,  though  there  was  forty  times 
the  reason  for  shooting  him  in  i860  that  there 
was  in  1865,  and  at  least  forty  times  as  many 
intent  on  killing  him  or  having  him  killed.  No 
shot  was  then  fired,  however  ;  for  his  hour  had 
not  yet  come." 

It  seems  singular  to  find  Horace  Greeley 
criticising  Mr.  Lincoln  on  the  following 
grounds,  which  so  exactly  expressed  his  own 
attitude  and  short-sightedness  in  the  same  pre- 
cise particulars  :  "A  genial,  quiet,  essentially 
peaceful  man,  he  fully  believed  that  there 
would  be  no  civil  war, — no  serious  desire  to 
consummate  disunion.  His  faith  in  reason  as 
a  moral  force  was  so  implicit  that  he  did  not 
cherish  a  doubt  that  his  inaugural  address, 
whereon  he  had  bestowed  much  thought  and 
labor,  when  read  throughout  the  South,  would 
dissolve  the  Confederacy  as  frost  is  dissipated 
by  a  vernal  sun." 

We  close  these  significant  and  self-indicting 


254  HORACE   GREELEY. 

comments  of  Mr.  Greeley  by  the  following  :  "  I 
did  not  favor  his  renomination  as  President, 
for  I  wanted  the  war  driven  onward  with  ve- 
hemence, and  this  was  not  in  his  nature.  Al- 
ways dreading  that  the  national  credit  would 
fail  or  the  national  resolution  falter,  I  feared 
that  his  easy  ways  would  allow  the  Re- 
bellion to  obtain  European  recognition  and 
achieve  ultimate  success.  But  that  '  Divinity 
that  shapes  our  ends  '  was  quietly  working 
out  for  us  a  larger  and  fuller  deliverance  than 
I  had  dared  to  hope  for,  leaving  to  such  short- 
sighted mortals  as  I,  no  part  but  to  wonder  and 
adore.  We  have  had  chieftains  who  would 
have  crushed  out  the  Rebellion  in  six  months, 
and  restored  *  the  Union  as  it  was  ;'  but  God 
gave  us  the  one  leader  whose  control  secured 
not  only  the  downfall  of  the  Rebellion,  but  the 
eternal  overthrow  of  human  slavery  under  the 
flag  of  the  Great  Republic  !" 

But  while  Horace  Greeley's  course  through- 
out the  war  was  so  marred  and  injured  in  its 
influence  by  his  Quixotism  and  want  of  con- 
sistency, it  would  be  unjust  to  deny  that  his 
efforts  for  the  Union  were  unstinted  and  inde- 
fatigable. The  correspondents  of  the  Tribune 
were  kept  within  the  rebel  lines  and  through- 
out the  South,  in  disguise,  at  the  momentary 
peril  of  their  lives,  and   furnished  much  valu- 


THE   POLITICIAN.  255 

able  information.  Mr.  Greeley  would  doubt- 
less have  gone  thither  himself,  if  it  had  been 
required,  and  perished  without  a  tremor  or  a 
regret  in  his  country's  cause.  In  fact,  during 
the  winter  of  1860-61  he  went  to  within  one 
hundred  miles  of  St.  Louis,  to  lecture  by  invi- 
tation, when  a  telegram  from  leading  Republi- 
cans there  withdrew  the  invitation  out  of  fear 
for  his  safety,  and  he  was  compelled  to  return. 
He  was,  in  fact,  the  conspicuous  object  of 
hatred  and  designing  malice  on  the  part  of 
Southern  sympathizers  in  the  North.  The 
Herald  for  two  years  from  the  outbreak  of  the 
war  had  continuously  "  held  up  the  Tribune  and 
its  editor  to  popular  execration,  and  intimated 
that  the  time  would  come  when  the  people 
would  see  this,  and  hang  the  editor  upon  a 
lamp-post."  Much  of  its  language  is  not  fit 
for  reproduction  here,  charging  "  this  crazy, 
contemptible  wretch"  with  the  vilest  of  teach- 
ings and  crimes,  and  with  involving  his  country 
in  a  civil  war  which  would  result  in  the  extermi- 
nation of  the  white  or  the  black  race.  He  was 
charged, — "  that  horrible  monster,  Greeley,  as 
he  is  called  on  the  floor  of  Congress," — with  a 
purpose  to  destroy  the  Republic,  and  his 
motive  as  a  lust  for  gain.  He  was  variously 
explained  as  being  "  insane,"  or  **  possessed 
of  a  devil,"  or  **  only  a  bad  man  made  worse 
by  cupidity  and  disappointment ;"  and  an  elab- 


256  HORACE   GREELEY. 

orate  attempt  was  made  to  strike  a  balance- 
sheet  between  the  "  Government  of  the  United 
States,  in  account  with  the  New  York  Trib- 
une,'' charging  the  pecuniary  losses  and  ex- 
penses of  the  war,  and  spoils  gathered  by  the 
editors  and  attaches  of  that  paper,  and  also  the 
killed  and  wounded,  to  the  "  monster,  ogre, 
ghoul."  **  Poor  Greeley  makes  money  out  of 
the  war.  He  has  contracts  which  cease  when 
the  war  ends,  and  therefore  he  is^ determined 
that  the  war  shall  continue.  Mad  with  greed, 
he  rushes  on  to  his  ruin,  when  the  people  shall 
lose  all  patience  and  suddenly  annihilate  him 
and  his  infamous  Tribune,  That  time  seems 
not  very  far  distant." 

Poor  Greeley,  indeed  !  He  stood  between 
two  fires — the  one  for  trying  prematurely  to  end 
the  war,  and  the  other  for  wilfully  prolonging  it  ! 
These  incitements  to  personal  outrage  at  length 
produced  their  intended  fruit.  During  the  draft 
riots  in  July,  1863,  the  office  of  the  Tribune 
was  threatened  by  a  mob  of  several  hundreds 
of  the  most  ruffianly  and  vicious  characters 
which  the  slums  of  New  York  could  produce. 
They  had  been  hunting  negroes  all  day,  and 
intended  to  diversify  their  recreations  by 
**  killin'  the  niggers  up  there,"  pointing  to  the 
editorial  rooms  of  the  Tribune.  By  and  by 
they  proceeded  from  jeers  and  threats  to  stone- 
throwing,  and  to  a  charge  upon  the  building. 


THE    POLITICIAN.  257 

overthrowing  the  small  band  of  police  stationed 
in  front  of  it,  smashing  the  shutters  and  win- 
dows and  doors,  and  pouring  into  the  building. 
But  just  at  that  moment  the  discharge  of  a 
pistol  and  the  appearance  of  a  body  of  troops 
sent  the  cowardly  roughs  flying  in  a  panic,  and 
saved  the  Tribune  building.  Its  editor  also  was 
barely  saved.  He  had  started  forth  in  the  morn- 
ing, as  usual,  to  go  down  to  his  office  through  the 
mob,  distinctly  clamoring  for  his  blood,  but  was 
detained  by  his  friends  on  every  pretence. 
When  he  reached  Ann  Street  the  situation  was 
such  that  instant  recognition  seemed  inevitable  ; 
and  then  his  friends  insisted  on  thrusting  him 
into  a  carriage,  drawing  down  the  curtains,  and 
driving  him  back  home.  He  seemed  reckless 
of  personal  exposure,  though  entirely  conscious 
of  his  peril.  He  even  seemed  to  feel  a  desire 
to  be  sacrificed.  To  friends  and  messengers 
apprising  him  of  danger,  he  appeared  more 
calm  and  cool  than  on  ordinary  days.  "  Well, 
it  doesn't  make  much  difference,"  he  said, 
"  I've  done  my  work.  I  may  as  well  be  killed 
by  the  mob  as  die  in  my  bed.  Between  now 
and  next  time  is  only  a  little  while." 


CHAPTER   XVI. 

THE    POLITICIAN  :    RECONSTRUCTIOX. 

But  Horace  Greeley's  work  was  not  done. 
We  tell  the  story  of  what  yet  remained,  not 
venturing  to  make  any  dogmatic  estimate  of 
its  value  or  its  wisdom,  and  desirous  only  that 
each  one  judge  the  incidents  by  the  man  rather 
than  the  man  by  the  incidents. 

In  the  work  of  reconstruction,  which  now 
claimed  the  primary  attention  of  all,  and  a  po- 
litical and  legislative  war  almost  as  fierce  and 
fiery  as  the  armed  contest,  it  was  easy  to  pre- 
dict what  Mr.  Greeley's  course  would  be,  and 
even  to  what  it  would  finally  gravitate.  He 
seems  to  have  had  no  sense  of  retributive  jus- 
tice in  his  nature,  or  even  of  exemplary  dam- 
ages. Results  and  "hind-thought"  have  de- 
monstrated that  our  botch-work  and  failure 
in  reconstruction  have  arisen  from  a  halting, 
inconsistent,  and  incompatible  policy,  or  want 
of  policy.  Either  punitive  and  retributive 
measures  should  at  once  and  forever  have  been 
calmly  and  judicially  taken,  while  the  guilty 
leaders  of  the  Rebellion  were  expecting  it  as  a 
matter  of  course  ;  or  else  a  complete  and  uni- 


THE   POLITICIAN.  259 

versal  amnesty  and  restoration  of  rights  to  all 
willing  to  accept  it,  exacting  only  the  acknowl- 
edged results  of  the  contest,  should  have  been 
conceded.  Instead  of  that,  the  sudden  and 
execrable  taking  off  of  Abraham  Lincoln,  the 
wretched  change  of  President  Johnson  from  an 
almost  maniacal  fury  to  a  weak  and  subser- 
vient concession,  and  his  consequent  quarrel 
with  Congress,  robbed  the  dominant  party  of 
their  cooler  reason,  and  prevented  any  final 
settlement  of  the  case  whatever. 

Mr.  Greeley's  suggestion  to  the  Government 
at  this  time,  if  acted  upon,  might  have  pro- 
duced most  beneficent  results.  It  was,  that  a 
joint  committee  of  six  eminent  citizens,  such 
as  Governor  Andrew,  Judge  Spaulding,  and 
Gerrit  Smith,  of  the  North,  and  General  Lee, 
Alexander  H.  Stephens,  etc.,  of  the  South,  be 
invited  to  meet  at  the  White  House  in  consul- 
tation with  the  President,  and  try  to  agree 
upon  some  plan  which  would  commend  itself 
to  a  majority  of  Congress.  The  cause  of  the 
failure  of  this  scheme,  after  its  initiation,  Mr. 
Greeley  believed  to  be  "  that  the  President  did 
not  want  harmony  with  Congress,  that  he  had 
already  made  up  his  mind  to  break  with  the 
party  which  had  elected  him,  and  seek  a  fur- 
ther lease  of  power  through  the  favor  and  sup- 
port of  its  implacable  enemies." 

Mr.  Greeley  kept   this  flag  flying  over  the 


26o  HORACE    GREELEY. 

Trtdune  at  this  period  :  "  Universal  Amnesty, 
— Impartial  Suffrage.  ' '  His  summary  of  the 
things  which  had  been  decided  by  the  war  was 
this  :  That  these  States  were  a  iiation,  carrying 
with  it  a  primary  allegiance  and  protection,  and 
the  power  to  pass  such  laws  as  the  Civil  Rights 
Bill  ;  that  this  is  to  be  a  land  of  only  free  peo- 
ple, and  of  unconditional  suffrage  as  regards 
race  or  color  ;  and  that  it  shall  be  the  duty  of 
the  Government  to  see  that  the  freedmen  shall 
not  be  deprived  of  their  rights,  or  interfered 
with  in  their  pursuit  of  happiness. 

Thus  things  went  on,  until  he  performed  an 
act  (to  which  we  have  before  referred)  as 
profoundly  characteristic  as  it  was  profoundly 
unwise,  because  sure  to  revive  anew  and  need- 
lessly the  old  animosity  between  North  and 
South,  and  of  his  own  party  against  him- 
self. After  Jefferson  Davis  had  been  captured 
in  his  attempt  to  escape  by  the  Florida  coast, 
he  was  closely  and  rigorously  imprisoned  in 
Fortress  Monroe,  indicted  for  treason,  and  so 
remained  for  nearly  two  years  without  any  at- 
tempt to  bring  him  to  trial.  Under  this  con- 
dition of  things,  and  in  the  slight  prospect  of 
a  trial  under  President  Johnson  or  by  the  im- 
pulse of  the  people,  it  was  natural  that  his 
friends  should  desire  him  to  be  released  on 
bail.     It  was  also  natural  that  his  counsel,  a 


THE    POLITICIAN.  261 

friend  of  Horace  Greeley,  should  consult  him 
as  to  obtaining  the  names  of  bondsmen  com- 
posed of  conspicuous  opponents  of  the  Rebel- 
lion and  of  the  errors  which  led  to  it.  It  was 
not,  however,  natural  that  Horace  Greeley,  of 
all  men,  should  offer  himself.  One  less  iden- 
tified with  the  storm  and  stress  of  the  anti- 
slavery  and  battle  epoch  would  not  have  given 
to  the  still  panting  and  bleeding  Unionists  that 
rude  shock,  which  soured  conciliation  into  a 
new  antipathy.  As  it  was,  the  effect  was  to 
divert  the  attention  of  the  Republicans  from 
the  intent  of  the  act  to  the  incongruity  of  the 
actor,  and  to  present  him  to  the  very  minds 
which  he  claimed  to  represent,  as  an  Iscariot, 
or  at  least  as  a  lost  leader.  Besides,  his  later 
record  had  been  such  that  he  did  not  represent 
to  the  Southern  mind  that  element  of  the  North 
at  Vv'hose  mercy  they  stood,  and  which  still  held 
control  of  their  future. 

The  uproar  excited  by  this  act  can  only  be 
estimated  by  those  who  passed  through  it. 
And  yet  it  was  only  an  intensifying  and  a  cul- 
mination of  what  had  been  exhibiting  itself 
since  his  manifesto  in  favor  of  clemency  and 
conciliation,  on  the  very  morning  after  the  sur- 
render of  General  Lee,  but  which  blazed  into 
new  fury  at  the  assassination  of  President 
Lincoln.      He  reminds  the  Union  League  Club 


262  HORACE    GREELEY. 

of  his  reception  by  them  on  the  Saturday  fol- 
lowing the  latter  event  :  "I  received  a  full 
broadside  of  your  scowls,  ere  we  listened  to  a 
clerical  harangue  intended  to  prove  that  Mr. 
Lincoln  had  been  providentially  removed  be- 
cause of  his  notorious  leanings  toward  clem- 
ency, in  order  to  make  way  for  a  successor  who 
would  give  the  rebels  a  full  measure  of  stern 
justice.  I  was  soon  made  to  understand  that 
I  had  no  sympathizers — or  none  who  dared 
seem  such — in  your  crowded  assemblage.  And 
some  maladroit  admirer  having,  a  few  days 
afterward,  made  the  Club  a  present  of  my  por- 
trait, its  bare  reception  was  resisted  by  your 
then  president,  in  a  speech  whose  vigorous  in- 
vective was  justified  solely  by  my  pleadings 
for  lenity  to  the  rebels."  A  more  serious  on- 
slaught from  another  quarter  is  thus  vigorously 
indicated  :  "  At  once  a  concerted  howl  of  de- 
nunciation and,  rage  was  sent  up  from  every 
side  against  me  by  the  little  creatures  whom 
God,  for  some  inscrutable  purpose,  permits  to 
edit  a  majority  of  our  minor  journals,  echoed  by 
a  yell  of  '  Stop  my  paper  '  from  thousands  of  im- 
perfectly instructed  readers  of  the  Tribune, 
One  impudent  puppy  wrote  me  to  answer  cate- 
gorically whether  I  was  or  was  not  in  favor  of 
hanging  Jefferson  Davis,  adding  that  I  must 
stop  his  paper  if  I  were  not  !  Scores  volun- 
teered   assurances  that   I   was  defying  public 


THE    POLITICIAN.  263 

Opinion  ;  that  most  of  my  readers  were  against 
me, — as  if  I  could  be  induced  to  write  what  they 
wished  said  rather  than  what  they  needed  to 
be  told.  I  never  before  realized  so  vividly  the 
baseness  of  the  editorial  vocation,  according  to 
the  vulgar  conception  of  it." 

This  uproar  has  long  slept  now  in  the  grave 
of  its  author,  though  there  is  a  very  general 
consensus  among  the  "  Old  Guard"  that 
"  somebody  blundered  ;"  and  the  mention  of 
it  is  too  apt  to  evoke  the  quick  censure,  drawn 
from  the  depths  of  old  prejudice  rather  than  of 
later  reflection,  of  the  man  himself.  The 
writer  has  not  changed  his  own  opinion  of  the 
unwisdom  and  Quixotism  of  Mr.  Greeley's 
course,  any  more  than  his  opinion  of  the  un- 
wisdom of  the  course  pursued  in  reconstruction 
by  both  the  Republican  and  the  Southern 
leaders.  But  he  clearly  sees,  as  he  did  not 
then  see,  that  the  most  condemned  and  un- 
popular act  of  Horace  Greeley's  life  was  the 
most  magnanimous  and  disinterested,  and  at 
the  same  time  one  of  the  most  characteristic. 
It  is  not  our  province,  or  our  wish,  to  regard 
it  from  the  standpoint  of  party,  or  in  the  in- 
terests of  reconstruction,  but  purely  as  the  act 
and  impulse  of  the  man  himself.  We  find  in 
it  the  key-note  of  his  character  and  his  career, 
revealing  his  Puritan  independence,  his  intense 
passion  for  justice  to  every  man,  though  it  were 


264  HORACE   GREELEY. 

the  deadliest  enemy  of  himself  and  his  country, 
and  his  tenderness  of  nature  toward  the  weaker 
and  the  fallen.  He  may  seem  shockingly  in- 
consistent. He  was  so,  when  viewed  as  a  par- 
tisan ;  and  when  this  act  is  compared  with  some 
of  his  earlier  ones,  or  with  certain  of  his  ut- 
terances, or  with  the  logic  of  his  life-work 
as  a  whole.  But  he  was  eminently  consis- 
tent with  himself,  with  his  own  ethical  ideals, 
and  his  most  essential  social  and  political 
principles.  There  have  been  many  elaborate 
defences  of  his  course,  as  well  as  unsparing  at- 
tacks upon  it  ;  but  none  of  the  former  have 
seemed  so  entirely  in  keeping  with  the  man, 
or  so  explanatory  of  his  action  in  this  and  in 
many  other  things,  as  that  which  he  himself 
compressed  within  the  nutshell  of  an  anecdote  : 
"  An  Irishman,  swearing  the  peace  against  his 
three  sons  for  pertinaciously  assaulting  and 
abusing  him,  made  this  proper  reservation  : 
'  And  your  deponent  would  ask  your  honor  to 
deal  tenderly  with  his  youngest  son,  Larry, 
who  never  struck  him  when  he  was  down. '  I 
confess  to  some  fellow-feeling  with  Larry." 

The  bailing  of  Jefferson  Davis  was  "  foolish- 
ness to  men  ;"  but  the  time  is  coming,  if  it  is 
not  now,  when  his  countrymen  will  regard  it 
as  one  of  the  bravest,  most  generous,  and  most 
chivalric  deeds  in  all  the  political  history  of 
America.     He  had  nothing  to  gain  for  himself, 


THE    POLITICIAN.  265 

and  everything  to  lose.  Mr.  Worldly  Wiseman 
would  never  have  dreamed  of  it.  It  is  to  this 
day,  with  multitudes,  his  unpardonable  sin. 
He  had  not  even  the  most  casual  acquaintance 
with  the  man  to  whom  he  sought  to  do  an  act 
of  justice,  much  less  was  he  drawn  to  him  by 
a  personal  liking  or  approbation  ;  the  only 
communication  he  ever  had  with  him  was  a 
passing  introduction  in  the  court-room  when 
the  bond  was  signed. 

Two  occasions  may  be  instanced  for  the  pur- 
pose of  illustrating  Mr.  Greeley's  personal  in- 
dependence, his  changed  relations  both  toward 
his  old  foes  and  his  old  friends,  and  also  the  atti- 
tude to  which  he  was  being  steadily  driven  by 
this  culminating  act  of  his  policy  toward  the 
South. 

One  was  his  address,  by  invitation,  while  on 
this  mission  to  Richmond,  to  a  vast  assembly 
of  white  and  black  citizens  in  the  African 
Church.  The  key-note  of  his  speech  was  in  the 
language  of  the  Hebrew  prophet,  "  Shall  the 
sword  devour  forever?"  Defining  his  appear- 
ance there  as  directed  neither  "  for  a  party  nor 
to  a  party,"  and  in  the  interests  only  of  "  our 
common  country,"  he  proposed  to  speak  to 
them  with  both  frankness  and  kindness.  He 
recapitulated  the  story  of  the  great  Rebellion, 
the   assassination    of    President    Lincoln,  the 


266  HORACE    GREELEY. 

hostile  attitude  and  unjustifiable  legislation  of 
the  restored  States  toward  their  negro  fellow- 
citizens  ;  and  plainly  told  them  that  no  recon- 
struction could  be  real  and  enduring  which  did 
not  guarantee  the  rights  of  the  colored  people 
of  the  South, — "  and  when  I  say  rights,  I  mean 
their  equal  rights  with  any  and  all  other  per- 
sons." He  pictured  the  special  claim  which 
the  Southern  blacks  had  acquired  from  their 
late  masters  by  their  conduct  during  the  war, 
and  argued  their  case  from  every  point  of  view 
with  as  m.uch  freedom  as  if  he  were  speaking 
in  the  New  York  Academy  of  Music.  He  de- 
clared his  acceptance  of  the  proscription  em- 
bodied in  the  military  reconstruction  act  of 
Congress  "  as  a  precaution  a.g3iinst  present  dis- 
loyalty ;"  but,  at  the  same  time,  his  belief 
that  the  nation  would  insist  on  its  removal  as 
soon  "  as  reasonable  and  proper  assurances  are 
given  that  disloyalty  has  ceased  to  be  powerful 
and  dangerous  in  the  Southern  States."  He 
spoke  apologetically  of  the  violence  of  feeling 
in  the  North  during  the  last  two  years,  as  not 
unnatural  under  the  irritation  caused  by  the 
spirit  and  acts  of  the  South.  As  to  confisca- 
tion, he  showed  that  even  the  influence  and 
speeches  of  Thaddeus  Stevens — "  the  very  ablest 
as  well  as  oldest  member  of  Congress,"  its 
**  recognized  leader,"  and  "  one  of  the  strong- 
est men  who  has  been  seen  in  Congress  at  any 


THE    POLITICIAN.  267 

time" — had  been  entirely  without  effect,  and 
not  a  single  other  member  of  Congress  had 
gravely  proposed  any  measure  of  confiscation. 
He  deprecated  the  possible  insinuation  that  he 
regarded  it  as  a  condition  of  restoration  that 
the  Southern  whites  should  become  Republi- 
cans. He  heartily  wished  they  were,  for  he 
believed  the  Republican  Party,  "  while  it  has 
made  some  mistakes,  and  includes  its  fair  share 
of  fools  and  rascals,  does  yet  embody  the  nobler 
instincts  and  more  generous  aspirations  of  the 
American  people."  He  did  not  seek  their 
votes  for  his  ticket,  except  so  far  as  they  were 
converted  to  his  faith.  He  only  asked,  that 
such  as  were  not  converted  should  interpose  no 
obstacle  in  the  way  of  those  who  wished  so  to 
vote,  and  that  they  select  representatives  who 
could  take  the  oath  prescribed  by  Congress. 
Your  way  to  restoration  lies  through  the  gate 
of  obedience,  and  I  entreat  you  to  take  it 
promptly  and  heartily."  With  some  special 
advice  to  the  colored  people  to  become  land- 
owners, he  concluded  with  these  words  :  "  I 
exhort  you,  then,  Republicans  and  Conserva- 
tives, whites  and  blacks,  to  bury  the  dead  past 
in  mutual  and  hearty  good-will,  and  in  a  gen- 
eral, united  effort  to  promote  the  prosperity 
and  exalt  the  glory  of  our  long-distracted  and 
bleeding,  but  henceforth  reunited,  magnificent 
country." 


268  HORACE   GREELEV. 

It  may  well  be  considered  whether  the  abil- 
ity and  opportunity  of  giving  such  a  plain  talk, 
and  to  have  it  patiently  and  respectfully  listened 
to,  in  the  very  heart  of  the  rebel  South,  within 
two  years  of  the  war,  did  not  go  a  good  way 
to  compensate,  if  not  to  atone  for,  the  bailing 
of  Jefferson  Davis. 

The  other  event  to  which  we  have  referred 
was  his  letter  to  the  Union  League  Club  on 
May  23d,  1867,  in  response  to  an  invitation  of 
its  president  that  he  should  attend  a  special 
meeting,  "  for  the  purpose  of  taking  into  con- 
sideration the  conduct  of  Horace  Greeley,  a 
member  of  this  Club,  who  has  become  a  bonds- 
man for  Jefferson  Davis,  late  chief  officer  of  the 
Rebel  government,"  as  an  "  opportunity  of 
being  heard  on  the  subject."  The  gist  of  his 
spirited  and  defiant  answer  is  here  given  : 
"  Gentlemen,  I  shall  not  attend  your  meeting 
this  evening.  I  have  an  engagement  out  of 
town,  and  I  shall  keep  it.  I  do  not  recognize 
you  as  capable  of  judging  or  even  fully  appre- 
hending me.  You  evidently  regard  me  as  a 
weak  sentimentalist,  misled  by  a  maudlin  phi- 
losophy. I  arraign  you  as  narrow-minded 
blockheads,  who  would  like  to  be  useful  to  a 
great  and  good  cause,  but  don't  know  how. 
Your  attempt  to  base  a  great,  enduring  party 
on  the  hate  and  wrath  engendered  by  a  bloody 
civil  war,  is  as  though  you  should  plant  a  colony 


THE   POLITICIAN.  269 

on  an  iceberg  which  had  somehow  drifted  into 
a  tropical  ocean.  I  tell  you  here,  that,  out  of 
a  life  earnestly  devoted  to  the  good  of  human 
kind,  your  children  will  select  my  going  to 
Richmond  and  signing  that  bail-bond  as  the 
wisest  act,  and  will  feel  that  it  did  more  for 
freedom  and  humanity  than  all  of  you  were 
competent  to  do,  though  you  lived  to  the  age 
of  Methuselah."  He  asked  nothing  of  them 
but  to  proceed  to  their  purposed  expulsion  of 
him  in  a  direct  and  manly  way.  "  Understand, 
once  for  all,  that  I  dare  you  and  defy  you,  and 
that  I  propose  to  fight  it  out  on  the  line  that  I 
have  held  from  the  day  of  Lee's  surrender.  So 
long  as  any  man  was  seeking  to  overthrow  our 
Government,  he  was  my  enemy  ;  from  the  hour 
in  which  he  laid  down  his  arms,  he  was  my 
formerly  erring  countryman.  So  long  as  any 
is  at  heart  opposed  to  the  national  unity,  the 
Federal  authority,  or  to  that  assertion  of  the 
equal  rights  of  all  men  which  has  become  prac- 
tically identified  with  loyalty  and  nationality, 
I  shall  do  my  best  to  deprive  him  of  power  ; 
but  whenever  he  ceases  to  be  thus,  I  demand 
his  restoration  to  all  the  privileges  of  American 
citizenship.   ..." 

The  good  sense  of  the  Club,  its  appreciation 
of  pluck  and  independence,  and  its  sympathy 
with  the  evident  soreness  and  sickness  of  a 
badgered  and  wounded  heart,  contented  itself 


2/0  HORACE   GREELEY. 

with  passing  the  simple  resolution,  "  that  there 
is  nothing  in  the  action  of  Horace  Greeley, 
relative  to  the  bailing  of  Jefferson  Davis,  call- 
ing for  proceedings  in  this  Club." 

We  leave  Horace  Greeley  standing  on  this 
lonely  political  Teneriffe,  looking  wistfully  and 
somewhat  dazedly  into  the  future, — a  future  of 
which  he  felt  himself  called  to  be  the  explorer, 
if  not  the  discoverer  ;  called  not  less  to  endure 
the  hardship  and  the  isolation  incident  to  all 
who  are  in  advance  of  their  generation,  if  not 
of  their  day.  The  next  pages  of  his  life  were 
only  a  painful  but  brave  struggle  against  public 
sentiment,  party  feeling,  and  doubtless  more  or 
less  of  a  fire  in  the  rear  from  those  who  believed 
that  this  wayward  pilot  would  steer  his  own 
and  their  Trilncne  upon  the  rocks.  We  leave 
him  looking  out  into  a  fancied  Pacific,  while 
we  proceed  to  the  culminating  event  of  his 
strange  and  stormy  career,  and  the  extraordi- 
nary and  paradoxical  future  which  shaped  itself 
out  of  the  mists  before  him. 


CHAPTER    XVII. 

THE   CANDIDATE   FOR   OFFICE. 

It  is  not  within  the  scope  of  our  undertaking 
to  narrate  the  rise  of  the  Independents  in  the 
Republican  Party,  nor  their  history  except  so 
far^as  it  involved  that  of  Horace  Greeley.  It 
was  natural  that,  as  time  wore  on,  and  the 
great  facts  accomplished  by  the  war  had  been 
embodied  in  the  Constitution  and  in  legisla- 
tion, the  division  of  sentiment  on  the  general 
policy  of  reconstruction,  or  rather  of  dealing 
with  the  South,  in  governmental  interference, 
race  questions,  and  the  like,  should  show  itself 
more  distinctly.  Still  more  that  the  disgrace- 
ful failure  of  the  carpet-bag  governments,  and 
the  control  of  the  party  by  its  radical  element, 
under  the  able  and  relentless  leadership  of 
Thaddeus  Stevens,  should  render  the  dissent 
so  pronounced  as  to  threaten  a  party  revolt,  if 
not  dissolution. 

It  is  natural  that  the  long,  and  now  absolute, 
dominance  of  one  political  party  should  produce 
a  state  of  things  which  should  renew  the  at- 
tention of  political  reformers  to  the  question  of 
reforming  a  civil  service  that  carried  with  it  a 


272  HORACE   GREELEY. 

distribution  of  offices  simply  appalling,  if  regu- 
lated by  no  principle  but  that  of  the  spoils 
theory.  It  is  natural  that  the  growth  of  polit- 
ical corruption,  which  had  been  both  bred  and 
overlooked  by  the  exigencies  of  a  war  for  the 
country's  life,  should  now  become  the  object 
of  increased  and  alarmed  scrutiny  from  the 
very  clearing  of  the  atmosphere  which  the 
whirlwind  of  the  war  had  brought.  Especially 
was  this  effect  emphasized  by  the  rapid  series 
of  explosions  in  the  executive  and  legislative 
departments  during  the  first  term  of  Grant's 
administration,  resulting  in  part  from  the  fact 
that  the  time  had  come  for  the  subterranean 
gases  to  explode,  and  partly  because  of  the  in- 
felicitous appointments  which  the  easy  and 
credulous  methods  of  that  great  man  had  led 
him  into  making, — or  into  having  made  for  him. 
And  it  is  equally  natural  that  Horace  Greeley 
should  be  found  at  the  front  in  these  protests. 
Mr.  Greeley  had  never  ceased  to  be  a  Repub- 
lican, but  he  had  long  occupied  the  position  of 
an  independent  within  the  party, — certainly 
ever  since  the  rejection  of  his  compromise  and 
disunion  counsels  which  followed  upon  the 
election  of  Mr.  Lincoln  to  the  Presidency.  And 
having  been  all  his  lifetime  a  practical  politician 
quite  as  much  as  a  reformer,  it  was  impossible 
for  him  not  to  give  objective  form  and  direction 
to  his  agitations.     More  and  more  trenchant  and 


THE   CANDIDATE   FOR   OFFICE.  273 

continuous  became  his  criticisms  and  censures 
of  the  Administration,  till  at  last,  from  a  critic 
and  a  censor,  he  found  himself  in  the  attitude 
of  an  antagonist  and  a  pronounced  revolter. 
As  the  time  drew  near  for  the  election  of  1872, 
he  declared  uncompromising  opposition  to  the 
renomination  of  General  Grant,  and  made  no 
secret  of  his  determination  not  to  support  it  if 
made. 

The  nomination  was  inevitable.  The  large 
number  of  disaffected  and  independents  felt 
that  there  was  no  alternative  left  to  them  but 
to  stand  up  and  be  counted.  A  convention  of 
"  Liberals"  was  called  on  May  ist,  1872,  in 
the  city  of  Cincinnati.  It  was  a  very  large  and 
representative  body  from  all  parts  of  the  coun- 
try. Carl  Schurz  was  chosen  president,  and 
stated  the  objects  of  the  movement  substan- 
tially as  we  have  given  it  ;  and  on  the  third 
day  Mr.  Horace  White,  Chairman  of  the  Plat- 
form Committee,  reported  an  address  and 
resolutions,  which  were  enthusiastically  adopt- 
ed without  dissent.  The  address — an  arraicrn- 
ment  of  President  Grant  and  his  supporters — 
was  drawn  up  in  the  same  rhetorical  vein  as 
that  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence  against 
George  III.  The  resolutions,  after  recognizing 
and  reaffirming  the  results  of  the  war,  demand- 
ed universal  amnesty,  "  the  supremacy  of  the 
civil  over  the  military  authority,  and  impartial 


2/4  HORACE   GREELEY. 

suffrage, — for  the  individual,  the  largest  liberty 
consistent  with  public  order  ;  for  the  State, 
self-government  ;  and  for  the  nation,  a  return 
to  the  methods  of  peace  and  the  constitutional 
limitations  of  power. "  It  specially  emphasized 
civil-service  reform,  insisted  upon  a  return  to 
specie  payments,  and  remitted  the  question  of 
protection  and  free  trade  to  Congress,  "  wholly 
free  from  executive  interference  or  dictation." 
The  remainder  consists  of  undisputed  general- 
ities. 

A  number  of  names  were  prominently  before 
the  convention  for  the  Presidential  nomination, 
including  Charles  Francis  Adams,  ex-Senator 
Lyman  Trumbull,  Judge  David  Davis,  ex- 
Governor  Curtin,  and  B.  Gratz  Brown,  of  Mis- 
souri, who  subsequently  received  the  second 
place  upon  the  ticket.  The  real  contest  lay 
between  j\Ir.  Adams  and  Horace  Greeley.  The 
former  led  largely  on  the  first  ballot,  receiving 
203  votes  to  the  latter's  147,  out  of  a  total  of 
714.  Both  increased  their  vote  during  the  en- 
tire six  ballots  from  the  ranks  of  the  other 
candidates,  but  Mr.  Greeley  much  the  more 
rapidly,  receiving  on  the  second  ballot  239  to 
Mr.  Adams's  243.  On  the  sixth  ballot  the  two 
names  stood,  Greeley  332  to  his  competitor's 
324  (necessary  to  a  choice,  35S)  ;  but  before 
the  result  was  officially  announced  a  rapid 
changing  of  votes  took  place,  which   made  the 


THE   CANDIDATE   FOR   OFFICE.  275 

final  result,  Greeley  482,  and  Adams  187. 
There  is  no  reason  to  suppose  that  Mr.  Greeley 
either  sought  or  expected  this  nomination.  He 
had  made  no  concealment  of  his  preference  for 
Mr.  Trumbull.  He  was  not,  however,  present 
at  the  convention. 

Mr.  Greeley's  letter  of  acceptance  was  dated 
May  20th.  It  heartily  indorsed  the  platform, 
expressed  his  confidence  in  the  triumph  of  the 
movement,  and  promised  that,  if  elected,  he 
should  be  "  the  President,  not  of  a  party,  but 
of  the  whole  people."  The  preference  of  Mr. 
Greeley  to  Mr.  Adams  may  fairly  be  questioned 
as  to  its  expediency,  especially  in  view  of  the 
final  results,  but  there  can  be  no  doubt  of  its 
justice  and  pre-eminently  representative  char- 
acter. No  one  had  so  early  occupied  the 
ground  of  that  platform,  or  done  so  much  to 
educate  and  inspire  the  men  who  were  now 
prepared  to  stand  upon  it.  It  may  not  unfitly 
be  said  of  the  building  of  that  ship  : 

"   We  know  what  master  laid  thy  keel. 
What  workman  wrought  thy  ribs  of  steel. 
In  what  a  forge  and  what  a  heat 
Were  shaped  the  anchors  of  thy  hope." 

In  the  succeeding  month  of  July  the  Demo- 
cratic National  Convention  met  in  Baltimore. 
The  thoroughly  disheartened,  if  not  demor- 
alized condition  of  the  party,  and  its  recogni- 
tion of  the  utter  impossibility  of  succeeding  in 


2^6  HORACE   GREELEY. 

its  own  strength,  or  on  its  old  ground,  was 
demonstrated  by  its  adoption  both  of  the  plat- 
form and  the  candidates  of  the  Cincinnati  Con- 
vention. Mr.  Greeley,  in  his  letter  of  accept- 
ance, frankly  recognizes  expediency  as  the  sole 
motive  of  his  own  selection,  not  only  over  a 
typical  Democrat,  but  over  such  '*  liberals"  as 
Messrs.  Adams,  Trumbull,  Davis,  and  Brown. 
It  was  characteristic  of  him  to  say  :  "I  owe 
my  adoption  at  Baltimore  wholly  to  the  fact 
that  I  had  already  been  nominated  at  Cincin- 
nati, and  that  a  concentration  of  forces  upon 
any  new  ticket  had  been  proved  impracticable. 
He  then  proceeds  to  take  the  Democrats  at 
their  word,  and  to  fix  upon  them  the  full  sig- 
nificance and  responsibility  of  their  act,  in 
neither  "  accepting  the  candidates  of  the  Lib- 
eral Republicans  upon  grounds  entirely  their 
own,"  nor  (as  the  first  Whig  National  Con- 
vention did  in  nominating  Harrison  and  Tyler) 
presenting  them  without  adopting  any  platform 
whatever,  but  as  having  chosen  to  plant  them 
selves,  "  by  a  vote  nearly  unanimous,  upon  the 
fullest  and  clearest  enunciation  of  principles 
which  are  at  once  incontestably  Republican 
and  emphatically  Democratic."  He  reminds 
them  of  his  past  record  of  anti-slavery  service, 
insists  upon  the  full  enfranchisement  of  his 
''white  fellow-countrymen,"  and  an  amnesty 
"  complete  and  universal,  in  spirit  as  well  as  in. 


THE   CANDIDATE   FOR   OFFICE.  2// 

letter."  Heconcludes with  these  among  other 
words  :  "  Gentlemen,  your  platform,  which  is 
also  mine,  assures  me  that  Democracy  is  not  to 
stand  for  one  thing  and  Republicanism  for 
another,  but  that  those  terms  are  to  mean  in 
politics,  as  they  have  always  meant  in  the  dic- 
tionary, substantially  one  and  the  same  thing 
— namely,  Equal  rights,  regardless  of  creed,  or 
clime,  or  color.  I  hail  this  as  a  genuine  New 
Departure  from  outworn  feuds  and  meaningless 
contentions  in  the  direction  of  Progress  and 
Reform." 

Previously  to  his  nomination  for  the  Presi- 
dency, Horace  Greeley  had  been  presented 
several  times,  successfully  or  unsuccessfully,  as 
a  candidate  for  political  ofifice.  In  1861  he 
was  a  candidate  for  United  States  Senator 
before  the  Republican  caucus,  his  competitors 
being  William  M.  Evarts  and  Judge  Ira  Harris, 
— his  vote  on  the  first  ballot  being  40,  to  42  for 
the  former  and  20  for  the  latter,  with  a  scatter- 
ing vote  of  13.  It  soon  became  apparent  by 
his  increasing  vote  that  Mr.  Greeley  would  be 
nominated,  when,  by  his  own  admission,  Thur- 
low  Weed,  the  Warwick  and  Macchiavelli  of 
Republican  politics  (who  occupied  throughout 
a  place  in  the  Executive  Chamber  of  the  Capi- 
tol), succeeded  in  persuading  a  number  of  the 
supporters  of  Mr.   Evarts  to  "  switch  off"  in 


2/8  HORACE    GREELEY. 

favor  of  Harris,  so  as  to  give  him  sixty  votes 
to  Mr.  Greeley's  forty-nine,  and  thus  made  him 
Senator.  Mr.  Weed's  excuse  for  this  action 
was  Mr.  Greeley's  "  secession  sentiments"  and 
peace  policy.  Mr.  Greeley,  however,  and  his 
friends  preferred  to  consider  it  as  the  re- 
taliation for  his  own  part  in  defeating  Mr. 
Seward's  nomination  for  the  Presidency  in 
i860. 

In  1867,  he  was  a  delegate  at  large  to  the 
Convention  of  the  State  of  New  York  for  the 
revision  of  its  constitution,  concerning  which 
appointment  he  characteristically  remarks  (in 
repudiating  the  charge  of  having  been  greedy 
of  office),  "  I  for  some  time  earned  §6  per  day 
and  paid  $4  for  my  board."  In  1869  the  Re- 
publican Convention  had  nominated  a  State 
ticket  and  adjourned,  when  three  of  the  candi- 
dates peremptorily  declined  to  run.  The  State 
Committee,  in  their  desperation,  named  Horace 
Greeley  to  fill  the  vacancy  for  Comptroller,  in 
his  absence  on  a  lecturing  tour  in  the  West, 
without  asking  his  consent,  and  he  allowed  his 
name  to  stand.  So  also  in  the  previous  year 
his  name  was  used  as  their  "  forlorn  hope," 
by  the  Republicans  of  the  district  in  which  the 
Tribune  office  was  situated,  as  their  candidate 
for  Congress.  He  was  similarly  utilized  in  the 
Sixth  District  in  1870,  at  a  time  when  sickness 
prevented  his  making  a  personal  canvass.     In 


THE    CANDIDATE    FOR   OFFICE.  2/9 

all  of  these  instances,  defeat  was  a  foregone  con- 
clusion. 

In  1848  he  was  nominated  by  the  Whigs  for 
a  three-months'  vacancy  in  Congress  without 
his  previous  knowledge,  as  a  makeshift  to  take 
the  place  of  one  who  unexpectedly  declined — 
James  Brooks,  of  the  Express^  being  nominated 
for  the  full  term.  It  was  the  General  Taylor 
year,  and  he  was  carried  in  on  the  flood  tide, 
by  a  majority  of  more  than  two  thousand  over 
his  two  Democratic  ("  Cass"  and  "  Van 
Buren")  competitors.  He  received  over  two 
hundred  more  than  Mr.  Brooks.  His  declared 
sympathy  with  the  Irish  cause  both  gained  and 
lost  him  votes.  His  district  included  all  of 
New  York  above  Fourteenth  Street,  with  three 
wards  below,  including  about  one-third  of  the 
city's  population. 

The  Thirty-first  Congress  contained  many 
notable  names.  Webster,  Calhoun,  and  Clay- 
ton were  still  in  the  Senate.  Robert  C.  Win- 
throp  was  Speaker  of  the  House.  Mr.  Greeley 
considered  Alexander  H.  Stephens  its  "  most 
acute  and,  perhaps,  ablest  member.""  Other 
well-known  names  (some  of  them  since  too 
well  known)  were  Horace  Mann,  John  G. 
Palfrey,  Jacob  Collamer,  George  P.  Marsh, 
Joshua  R.  Giddings,  General  Robert  C. 
Schenck,  John  Wentworth,  Howell  Cobb, 
John  M.   Bolts,  Robert  Toojnbs,  Jacob  Thomp- 


28o  HORACE   GREELEY. 

son,  and  George  W.  Jones,  afterward  Speaker. 
We  have  placed  some  of  the  Whigs  in  itahcs. 
Above  all,  Abraham  Lincoln  sat  among  the 
Whigs,  and  Andrew  Johnson  among  the  Dem- 
ocrats, the  latter  in  his  third  term.  Mr. 
Greeley  says  of  the  former  :  "  Though  a  new 
member,  he  was  personally  a  favorite  on  our 
side.  He  seemed  a  quiet,  good-natured  man, 
did  not  aspire  to  leadership,  and  seldom  claimed 
the  floor  ;  I  think  he  made  but  one  set  speech 
during  that  session,  and  this  speech  by  no 
means  a  long  one.  Though  a  strong  partisan, 
he  voted  against  the  bulk  of  his  party  once  or 
twice,  when  that  course  was  dictated  by  his 
convictions.  He  was  one  of  the  most  moderate, 
though  firm  opponents  of  slavery  extension, 
and  was  notably  of  a  buoyant,  cheerful  spirit." 
He  expresses  his  conviction  that  there  were  not 
more  than  twelve  members  who  were  "  on  the 
make,"  and  that  they  were  "  a  class  by  them- 
selves as  clearly  as  if  they  were  so  many  black 
sheep  in  a  large  flock  of  white  ones." 

Horace  Greeley's  brief  career  in  this  Congress 
was  a  thoroughly  characteristic  one.  It  was 
rather  that  of  a  political  reformer  than  of  a 
routine  legislator  ;  and  his  methods  were  those 
of  a  newspaper  man  rather  than  of  a  parlia- 
mentarian. He  served  on  the  Committee  on 
Public  Lands.  His  first  act  on  taking  his  seat 
— the  very  next  day,  December    5th — was  to 


THE   CANDIDATE    FOR   OFFICE.  28 1 

give  notice  of  a  Land  Reform  bill  to  discour- 
age speculation  and  provide  cheap  homes  for 
actual  settlers.  The  Homestead  bill  he  intro- 
duced on  December  13th.  A  week  later,  he 
threw  his  famous  mileage  bomb  into  the  House 
from  the  citadel  of  the  Tribune.  This  was  a 
minute  and  unsparing  exposure  of  the  excessive 
sums  drawn  by  Members  of  Congress  for  trav- 
elling expenses,  whereby  "  they  now  charged 
and  received  twice  as  much  for  travelling  five 
days  in  a  sumptuous  cabin,  replete  with  every 
luxury,  as  their  fathers  paid  for  roughing  it 
over  the  mountains  in  fifteen  to  twenty  days  at 
a  far  greater  cost."  Improving  his  opportu- 
nity as  a  member,  he  obtained  access  to  the 
schedules  of  Compensation  and  Mileage.  He 
says  :  "  I  hired  a  reporter  to  transcribe  them, 
and  (using  as  a  basis  of  comparison  the  United 
States  Topographer's  ofificial  statement  of  the 
distances  from  Washington  by  the  most  direct 
mail-route  of  each  post-office  in  the  country) 
I  aimed  to  show  exactly  how  much  could  be 
saved  in  the  case  of  each  member,  by  comput- 
ing mileage  on  the  most  direct  post-route  in- 
stead of  "  the  usually  travelled  route,"  and 
published  the  result  in  his  paper. 

"  I  had  expected,"  he  says,  "  that  it  would 
kick  up  a  dust ;  but  my  expectations  were 
far  outrun. ' '  There  was  no  attempt  at  defence  ; 
the  only  reply,  by  the  best  men  involved,  was 


282  HORACE    GREELEY. 

that  they  complied  with  the  letter  of  the  law, — 
though  no  one  of  these  lawmakers  had  made 
any  movement  to  reform  the  law  by  adjusting 
mileage  to  the  changed  conditions  of  travel. 
But  there  was  a  very  vigorous,  and  partially 
successful  attempt  to  persecute  the  accuser  of 
the  brethren.  He  was  himself  accused  of  falsi- 
fication and  of  base  motives,  and  was  vilified  and 
ridiculed  in  every  form  of  oratory, — through 
all  of  which  he  sat  placid,  if  not  unheeding. 
Well  he  might,  for  the  whole  press  and  the 
country  were  on  his  side.  Advantage  was  taken 
of  his  inadvertently  voting  aye  on  an  extrava- 
gant item  for  books,  in  the  rapidity  and  confu- 
sion of  passing  the  Deficiency  bill,  which  he 
had  privately  denounced  and  declared  his  in- 
tention to  vote  against.  A  movement  was  set 
on  foot  to  expel  him,  which  was  nipped  in  the 
bud  by  *'  Long  John"  Wentworth's  character- 
istically saying,  "  Why,  you  blessed  fools,  do 
you  want  to  make  him  President  ?"  It  will  be 
borne  in  mind  that  all  this  time  jNIr.  Greeley 
had  not  introduced  the  subject  into  the  House, 
made  no  move  there  regarding  it,  and  scarcely 
alluded  to  it.  No  immediate  action  was  suc- 
cessfully taken,  but  this  was  the  entering  wedge 
which  long  ago  exploded  the  mileage  scandal 
and  extortion. 

This  was  Mr.  Greeley's  principal  achievement 
as  a  Congressman,  though  he  undertook  two  or 


THE   CANDIDATE    FOR    OFFICE.  283 

three  other  thankless  jobs  of  saving  the  people's 
money,  and  staying  the  mean  and  unscrupulous 
hands  of  his  fellow-members.  The  question  of 
slavery  in  the  new  Territories  acquired  by  the 
Mexican  War  was  already  a  burning  issue.  In 
fact,  the  slaveholders  were  cleverly  outwitted 
at  this  session,  by  accepting  the  motion  that 
for  the  present  "  the  existing  laws  should  re- 
main in  force  till  changed  by  consent  of  Con- 
gress," not  realizing  that  the  existing  laws 
were  those  of  Mexico,  which  forbade  slavery. 
Mr.  Greeley  took  no  leading  part  on  this  sub- 
ject, speaking  only  some  twenty  minutes  on  a 
single  occasion,  to  the  great  disappointment 
of  many  on  both  sides,  who  had  expected  him 
to  ride  it  as  a  hobby  in  the  House,  as  he  had 
in  his  paper.  The  ill-suppressed  excitement  of 
the  pro-slavery  men  is  illustrated  by  the  fact 
that,  on  the  occasion  just  alluded  to,  Mr.  Gid- 
dings  was  assaulted,  and  ]Mr.  Greeley  gives  it 
as  his  confident  belief  that,  "  1  could  not  have 
passed  quietly  through  the  Democratic  side  of 
the  House  between  ten  and  two  o'clock  that 
night  without  being  also  assaulted  ;  and,  had  I 
resisted,  beaten  within  an  inch  of  my  life,  if 
not  killed  outright." 

His  conclusion  of  the  whole  matter  is  thus 
stated  :  "  I  have  not  since  been  a  member,  nor 
held  any  post  under  the  Federal  Government  ; 
it  is  not  likely  that  I  ever  shall  again  hold  one. 


284  HORACE    GREELEY. 

Yet  I  look  back  upon  those  three  months  I 
spent  in  Congress  as  among  the  most  profitably 
employed  of  any  in  the  course  of  my  life.  I 
saw  things  from  a  novel  point  of  view  ;  and  if 
I  came  away  from  the  Capitol  no  wiser  than  I 
went  thither,  the  fault  was  entirely  my  own." 

Before  proceeding  to  his  Presidential  cam- 
paign, a  word  must  be  said  about  Horace 
Greeley's  relation  to  of^ce.  It  has  been  the 
endeavor  of  Mr.  Thurlow  Weed  and  his  echoes, 
ever  since  Mr.  Greeley's  death,  to  represent  him 
as  a  persistent  office-seeker,  childishly  ambi- 
tious of  any  and  every  appointment,  and  that 
this  affords  the  key  to  his  whole  public  career, 
and  his  relations  alike  to  the  Republican  Party 
and  his  connection  with  the  personal  fortunes 
of  William  H.  Seward.  We  have  already  in- 
dicated the  beggarly  showing  of  candidacies  and 
offices  which  fell  to  his  lot  up  to  the  time  at 
which  we  have  now  arrived,  and  which,  to- 
gether with  the  last,  were  honors  thrust  upon 
him.  On  one  or  two  occasions  he  seems  to 
have  suggested  to  ]\Ir.  Weed  "  a  willingness  to 
accept  nominations,"  but  that  gentleman  ad- 
mits, **  he  did  not  seem  anxious.."  And  he  al- 
ways readily  acquiesced  in  a  contrary  advice  or 
decision.  He  so  assented  to  the  setting  aside 
of  his  name  for  Governor  in  1854 — a  nomination 
which   he  had    never  asked   for  ;    the  special 


THE    CANDIDATE   FOR   OFFICE.  285 

cause  of  his  affront  being  that  the  Seward  and 
Weed  power  had  set  him  aside,  even  for  Lieu- 
tenant-Governor, in  favor  of  Henry  J.  Ray- 
mond's nomination,  which  he  regarded  as 
"  bitterly  humbling  to  himself."  There  is  no 
evidence  that  he  was  a  seeker  for  Federal  ap- 
pointments, though  he  deeply  felt  it  that  suc- 
cessive Administrations,  for  which  he  had 
labored  at  great  self-sacrifice,  not  even  passed 
the  compliment  of  offering  their  honors. 
Thurlow  Weed  screens  himself  behind  an  **  it  is 
said"  in  his  insinuation,  that  Mr.  Greeley  want- 
ed the  Postmaster-Generalship  under  Lincoln, 
though  the  dead  man  had  years  before  emphat- 
ically denied  it.  Mr.  Greeley  also  refutes  a 
World  slsLYider  in  1866,  by  showing  that  only 
one  or  two  persons  ever  connected  with  the 
Tribune  had  ever  received  Federal  appoint- 
ments. 

It  may  be  admitted  that  Mr.  Greeley's  rest- 
less nature  contemplated  public  duties  with 
pleasure,  and  that  he  believed  himself  emi- 
nently fitted  for  their  discharge.  It  is  plain, 
also,  that  this  much-beset  and  misrepresented 
man  craved  popular  recognition  ;  and  that, 
having  long  served  as  a  pack-horse  for  other 
men's  affairs,  he  felt  sore  and  humiliated  at  not 
being  offered  a  crumb  from  the  tables  which  he 
had  provided.  But  that  he  was  avid  for  office 
as  a  compensation  or  a  prize  in  itself,  there  is 


286  HORACE    GREELEY. 

no  evidence  ;  neither  that  he  was  ever  moved 
one  jot  in  his  poHtical  action  by  the  hopes  or 
fears  of  an  office-seeker. 

Of  course  even  this  was  unworthy  of  so 
great  a  man,  who  should  have  realized  that  his 
editorial  chair,  made  and  uplifted  by  his  own 
genius  and  industry,  was  a  higher  throne  than 
any  ready-made  one  into  which  he  could  be 
put.  Above  all,  he  was  inconsistent  with  him- 
self. In  1861  he  wrote  :  "  There  is  no  office 
in  the  gift  of  the  Government  or  of  the  people, 
which  I  either  hope,  wish,  or  expect  to  hold. 
I  certainly  shall  not  parade  myself  as  declining 
places  that  are  not  offered  for  my  acceptance  ; 
but  I  am  sure  that  the  President  has  always 
known  that  I  desired  no  office  at  his  hands  ; 
and  mutual  and  influential  friends  who  at  vari- 
ous times  volunteered  to  ask  me  whether  I 
would  take  any  place  whatever,  were  uniformly 
and  conclusively  assured  that  I  would  not." 
As  late  as  April,  1869,  he  expressed  his  opinion 
that  it  was  "  impossible  for  a  journalist  to  rec- 
oncile independence  in  his  profession  with 
office-holding  ;  a  journalist  who  holds  an  office 
writes  in  a  strait-jacket."  It  is  only  fair, 
however,  to  add,  that  he  said  also  in  the  same 
editorial,  that  he  did  not  **  regard  with  admira- 
tion the  practical  monopoly  of  all  important 
civil  trusts  by  men  bred  to  the  law, "  nor  "  that 
Ben  Franklin  degraded  or  disparaged  the  edi- 


THE   CANDIDATE   FOR   OFFICE.  28/ 

torial  profession  by  serving  his  country  as  Am- 
bassador and  Postmaster-General."  He  had 
no  patience  with  the  importunate  "  office-beg- 
gars," as  he  called  them,  who  beset  him,  or 
with  the  seeking  of  office  as  a  mere  reward  for 
political  services. 

In  1868  he  wrote  certain  words,  anent  Mr. 
Seward's  Presidential  aspiration,  which  he  lit- 
tle realized  would  so  soon  **  come  home  to 
roost"  in  his  own  barn  :  "  One  who  has  all  but 
clutched  the  glittering  prize,  yet  failed  to  se- 
cure it,  always  thereafter  seems  to  have  suffered 
from  the  aspiration  or  the  failure — possibly  from 
both.  Great,  intellectually,  as  Daniel  Webster 
was,  he  would  have  been  morally  greater,  and 
every  way  more  useful  and  honored,  had  he 
sternly  responded,  *  Get  thee  behind  me, 
Satan  !'  to  every  suggestion  that  he  might  yet 
attain  the  Presidency."  Alas!  men's  actions 
seldom  square  with  their  ideals.  Henry  J. 
Raymond,  one  of  the  most  inveterate  and  fa- 
vored office-seekers  among  our  great  journalists, 
could  write  :  **  The  Administrations  cannot 
render  the  country  a  greater  service  than  by 
excluding  the  controlling  conductors  of  the 
newspaper  press  from  public  office,  and  thus 
relieving  them  from  all  temptation  to  betray 
or  neglect  the  interests  which  are  mainly  com- 
mitted to  their  care."  Perhaps  if  these  two 
great  men  had  not  regarded  each  other  as  rivals 


288  HORACE   GREELEY. 

for  popular  or  Presidential  "  recognition,"  they 
might  have  been  less  bitter  enemies,  if  not  bet- 
ter friends.  The  nomination  of  the  editor  of 
the  Times  for  Lieutenant-Governor  in  1854,  is 
distinctly  stated  by  Thurlow  Weed  as  "  the  en- 
tering wedge  to  final  alienation  between  us," 
— meaning  between  himself  and  Mr.  Seward  on 
the  one  hand  and  Horace  Greeley  on  the 
other. 

Undoubtedly  it  was  very  wrong  for  Horace 
Greeley  to  let  himself  be  run  as  the  opposition 
candidate  for  the  Presidency — from  the  Repub- 
lican point  of  view.  But,  in  estimating  this  act 
of  this  man,  our  business  is  to  view  it  from  his 
own  standpoint.  This  has  been  luminously 
expressed  for  him  by  his  lifelong  friend  and  co- 
laborer,  Mr.  James  S.  Pike  :  **  His  being  a 
candidate  was  purely  a  secondary  and  accidental 
circumstance.  It  was  assumed  when  he  was 
scarcely  thought  of  as  a  Presidential  candidate, 
and  when  any  betting  man  would  have  offered 
a  thousand  to  one  against  his  chances  for  such 
a  nomination."  When  the  nomination  came 
which  placed  him  at  the  head  of  the  move- 
ment which  he  had  shaped  and  developed,  if 
not  originated,  **  what  was  Mr.  Greeley  to  do 
under  the  circumstances  ?  He  certainly  was 
not  to  blame  for  his  nomination.  He  had  not 
contrived  it  ;  he  had  not  anticipated  it.     Was 


THE   CANDIDATE    FOR   OFFICE.  289 

he  to  repel  the  spontaneous  judgment  at  Cin- 
cinnati, that  he  was  the  most  fit  man  to  nomi- 
nate ?  Was  he  to  withdraw,  and  say  he  would 
not  run  ?  It  is  none  too  much  to  say,  that  he 
could  with  propriety  do  neither.  Of  all  men 
in  the  movement,  it  was  not  for  him  to  balk  at 
the  first  step  of  the  convention,  and  thus  in- 
terpose an  obstacle  to  its  success  by  discredit- 
ing its  judgment.  Neither  because  the  Demo- 
crats subsequently  thought  it  for  their  interest 
to  confirm  the  nomination  and  to  accept  Mr. 
Greeley  as  their  candidate,  is  it  to  be  imputed 
to  him  for  a  crime.  He  was  but  the  passive 
recipient  of  unexpected  honors  from  his  old  ad- 
versaries. Their  action  did  not  change  his  own 
self-chosen  position,  nor  swerve  him  a  hair  from 
his  principles.  He  did  not  become  a  Demo- 
crat, or  a  representative  of  Democracy,  by  ac- 
cepting the  nomination.  He  was  the  same 
Horace  Greeley  and  the  same  R.epublican  as 
before,  and  would  have  so  remained  had  the 
fates  been  propitious  and  placed  him  in  the 
Presidential  chair." 

We  can  have  no  better  example  of  the  spirit 
of  independence,  as  well  as  of  determination 
to  betray  none  of  the  political  principles  for 
which  he  stood,  than  his  reply  to  a  free-trader 
who  urged  him  to  accept  that  policy  as  most 
likely  to  insure  success.  Mr.  Greeley  admits 
the  expediency  of  the  party's  adopting  that 


290  HORACE   GREELEY. 

position  :  "  I  have  no  doubt  as  to  the  policy," 
but  "  I  am  not  the  man.  ...  I  am  a  fero- 
cious protectionist.  You  must  take  some  man 
Hke  Gratz  Brown  or  Trumbull."  This  was 
written  October  i8th,  1871,  and  made  public. 
We  may  believe  that  Horace  Greeley  made 
a  mistake,  as  did  the  Democrats,  but  it  is  diffi- 
cult to  see  how  he  was  in  this  course  acting 
otherwise  than  it  was  his  right  to  do,  and  as  his 
highest  and  purest  sense  of  duty  compelled  him 
to  do. 


CHAPTER    XVIII. 

THE   CLOSING   SCENES. 

Mr.  Greeley's  canvass  was  signalized  by 
one  of  the  most  extraordinary  spectacles  ever 
witnessed  in  this  country.  For  the  first  time 
in  our  history  a  candidate  for  the  Presidency 
took  the  stump  and  traversed  every  part  of 
the  Union.  A  man  who  had  been,  perhaps,  the 
most  representative  and  most  cordially  hated 
anti-slavery  leader  of  the  North,  spoke  without 
hindrance  in  what  had  been  the  centres  of 
slavery,  secession,  and  war  in  the  South,  into 
which  he  had  not  been  permitted  to  penetrate 
even  for  a  lecturing  tour,  and  that  without 
withdrawing  one  jot  of  his  utterances,  or  swerv- 
ing one  hair's-breadth  from  his  attitude  toward 
slaveholding  and  disunion,  or  the  championship 
of  the  colored  race.  One  whose  life  had  been 
spent,  and  his  successes  achieved,  at  the  editor's 
desk  suddenly  sprang  into  the  front  rank  of 
popular  orators,  as  notable  for  the  logical  as  for 
the  rhetorical  strength  with  which  he  marshal- 
led and  propelled  his  argument.  He  spoke  in 
Maine  as  early  as  August  14th,  and  his  speeches 
were  of  daily   occurrence   during  most  of  the 


292  HORACE   GREELEY. 

intervening  time  till  the  election.  I  had  it 
from  the  lips  of  ex-Governor  Randolph,  of  New- 
Jersey,  just  after  his  return  from  an  official  ac- 
companying of  Mr.  Greeley  on  his  tour  through 
the  South,  that  the  experience  had  been  a  reve- 
lation to  him,  and  its  effect  a  total  revolution 
in  his  estimate  of  the  man.  He  had  been  any- 
thing but  an  adrnirer,  and  the  nomination  was 
highly  distasteful  to  him.  But  he  came  home 
with  something^  akin  to  reverence  for  the  single- 
minded  and  chivalric  spirit,  and  for  the  vast 
and  varied  resources,  and  consummate  skill  and 
force  in  using  them,  as  well  as  for  the  almost 
superhuman  endurance  which  marked  this  un- 
paralleled canvass. 

In  his  key-note  speech  at  Portland,  Me.,  Mr. 
Greeley  not  only  emphatically  stated  that  no 
claim  or  suggestion  of  office  had  ever  been  made 
by  any  one  who  favored  his  nomination  at 
either  convention,  but  he  deliberately  gave 
notice  that  if  any  did,  he  must  expect  to  stand 
aside  for  "  the  more  modest  and  reticent." 
He  furthermore  declared  that  "  no  man  or 
woman  in  all  the  South  ever  asked  of  me,  either 
directly  or  through  another,  any  other  pledge 
than  is  given  in  all  my  acts  and  words  from  the 
hour  of  Lee's  surrender  down  to  this  moment. 
.  .  .  From  those  who  support  me  in  the  South 
I  have  heard  but  one  demand,  justice  ;  but  one 
desire,  reconciliation." 


THE   CLOSING   SCENES.  293 

Shortly  after  receiving  the  Cincinnati  nomi- 
nation, Mr.  Greeley  issued  the  following  card  : 
"  The  Tribune  has  ceased  to  be  a  party  organ, 
but  the  unexpected  nomination  of  its  editor 
seems  to  involve  it  in  a  new  embarrassment. 
All  must  be  aware  that  the  position  of  a  jour- 
nalist who  is  at  the  same  time  a  candidate  is  at 
best  irksome  and  difficult, — that  he  is  fettered 
in  action  and  restrained  in  criticism  by  the 
knowledge  that  whatever  he  may  say  or  do  is 
closely  scanned  by  thousands  eager  to  find  in 
it  what  may  be  so  interpreted  as  to  annoy  or 
perplex  those  who  are  supporting  him  as  a 
candidate,  and  to  whom  his  shackled  condition 
will  not  permit  him  to  be  serviceable.  The 
undersigned,  therefore,  withdraws  absolutely 
from  the  conduct  of  the  Trihine,  and  will 
henceforth  until  further  notice  exercise  no  con- 
trol or  supervision  over  its  columns." 

Inasmuch  as  the  course  which  he  pursued  as 
a  constant  platform-speaker  throughout  the 
canvass  was  replete  with  the  same  "  embarrass- 
ments" and  perils  from  the  standpoint  of  his 
own  candidacy,  we  may,  perhaps,  be  permitted 
to  read  between  these  lines  a  latent  doubt 
whether  "the  Tribune,''  however  it  might 
favor  the  election  of  its  editor,  was  likely  to  al- 
low itself,  without  much  generating  of  internal 
combustion,  to  become  the  personal  organ  of  the 
opposition  party's  candidate  for  the  Presidency. 


294  HORACE   GREELEY. 

The  result  of  this  memorable  campaign  may 
be  briefly  stated.  Of  the  popular  vote,  Mr. 
Greeley  received  2,834,079,  to  3,597,070  for 
General  Grant  ;  of  the  States  only  Maryland, 
Georgia,  Kentucky,  Tennessee,  Missouri,  and 
Texas  went  for  him.  One  of  the  saddest  fea- 
tures of  this  pitiable  exliibit  is,  that  even  the 
electoral  votes  which  he  had  won  could  not  be 
recorded  for  his  name. 

The  causes  of  his  defeat  are  not  far  to  seek. 
The  first  was  the  unshakable  hold  of  General 
Grant  upon  the  popular  imagination,  gratitude, 
and  confidence,  which  led  men  to  disconnect 
him  from  the  responsibilities  of  his  administra- 
tion. The  second  was  a  widespread  distrust  of 
Mr.  Greeley's  fitness  for  the  office, — of  his 
"  levelness,"  his  practical  capacity,  and  of  his 
consistency.  The  third  and  fundamental  one 
was  the  yet  impregnable  power  of  the  Repub- 
lican Party  over  the  masses  of  the  people,  and 
the  irresistible  momentum  which  it  had  gained 
as  the  saviour  of  the  nation.  The  fourth  was 
the  still  potent  feeling  of  the  Union  element, 
which  Homer's  Trojan  expressed  in  the  much- 
quoted  words  :  **  Timeo  Danaos  et  dona  fe- 
rentes. 

And,  finally,  the  South  itself  was  not  ready 
to  swallow  so  old  and  alien  a  bait  as  Horace 
Greeley,  nor  was  it  at  all  confident  that  he 
would   not   prove   quite   unmanageable  ;    they 


THE   CLOSING   SCENES.  295 

naturally  queried  whether  ' '  the  game  was  worth 
the  bag." 

It  is  said  that  Mr.  Greeley  confidently  ex- 
pected his  own  election  up  to  the  last  hour. 
His  remarkable  political  foresight  and  calmness 
of  judgment  forsook  him,  as  I  have  known 
physicians,  notable  for  their  prognosis  of  other 
people's  cases,  utterly  self-deceived  in  their 
own.  But  bitter  and  keen  as  the  disappoint- 
ment was,  it  is  not  likely  that  it  would  of  itself 
have  crushed  a  spirit  so  inured  to  harsh  expe- 
rience, or  broken  down  a  constitution  so  rugged 
and  splendid  in  health.  Promptly,  as  soon  as 
the  result  was  known  (November  6th),  he  pub- 
lished another  card,  resuming  his  editorship  of 
the  Tribune,  which  he  had  relinquished  "  on 
embarking  in  another  line  of  business."  But 
to  the  terrific  exertions  and  excitement  of  the 
past  months,  following  upon  a  whole  life  of  in- 
tense toil  and  strain,  came  the  illness  and  death 
of  his  wife  during  the  later  stages  of  his  can- 
vass. He  watched  at  her  bedside  day  and 
night.  His  own  sense  of  the  stress  and  ex- 
haustion of  those  days  was  expressed  to 
a  friend  about  a  week  before  she  died  :  "  I 
am  a  broken  old  man  ;  I  have  not  slept 
one  hour  in  twenty-four  for  a  month  ;  if  she 
lasts,  poor  soul,  another  week,  I  shall  go 
before  her. "     Insomnia  resulted  in  brain  fever, 


296  HORACE    GREELEY. 

and  on  November  29th  he  rested  from  his 
labors. 

His  funeral  was  one  of  the  most  notable  which 
New  York  has  ever  witnessed.  The  great  heart 
of  the  city,  where  this  eminent  and  devoted 
citizen  had  so  long  wrought  and  fought,  seemed 
to  awake  to  an  appreciation  too  long  deferred, 
and  to  a  profound  and  affectionate  sympathy. 
By  a  general  request  the  body  was  laid  in  state 
in  the  City  Hall,  and  for  one  whole  day  thie  plain 
people  poured  through  in  a  continuous  stream 
(estimated  at  over  forty  thousand),  to  look  once 
more  upon  the  pure  and  kindly  face  of  their 
"Tribune."  "  The  poor  shed  tears  over  him  ; 
the  laboring  man  stopped  work,  that  he  might 
pay  a  last  tribute  to  him  who  spent  forty  years 
in  working  hard  for  the  benefit  of  workers.  A 
more  spontaneous  manifestation  of  universal 
sorrow  has  not  been  seen  in  this  generation." 

Everything  was  arranged  with  a  simplicity 
which  became  the  man,  and  the  ceremonies 
were  only  the  more  impressive.  Funeral  ser- 
vices were  held  in  the  Church  of  the  Divine 
Paternity,  with  which  he  was  connected,  and 
were  conducted  by  his  pastor,  Dr.  Chapin,  who 
delivered  a  funeral  discourse,  and  by  Henry 
Ward  Beecher,  who  also  made  an  address. 
Other  distinguished  clergymen  occupied  the 
pulpit,  and  among  those  present  were  the  Presi- 
dent and   Vice-President   and  Chief-Justice  of 


THE   CLOSING   SCENES.  297 

the  United  States,  the  Governor  of  the  State, 
and  the  Mayor  of  the  city,  Senators  and  Mem- 
bers of  Congress,  and  others  of  official  rank. 
All  along  the  route  of  the  procession — consist- 
ing of  a  hundred  and  twenty  carriages,  with  no 
music  or  military  guard — the  places  of  business 
were  closed,  and  the  public  and  private  build- 
ings draped  with  mourning,  and  the  streets 
were  lined  by  throngs  of  citizens  in  respectful 
silence.  The  bells  of  St.  Paul's  and  Trinity 
were  tolled  as  the  cortege  passed  down  Broad- 
way to  the  Whitehall  Ferry.  The  remains 
were  interred  in  Greenwood  Cemetery, 

The  closing  scenes  of  Horace  Greeley's  life 
were  strikingly  dramatic,  and  with  not  a  little 
of  the  tragic  element.  They  were  the  culmi- 
nation of  a  long  Promethean  struggle,  at  fearful 
odds,  in  behalf  of  his  race  and  country,  whose 
tardy  appreciation  he  never  lived  to  receive. 
In  fact  he  died  under  the  crushing  weight  of 
an  apparent  verdict  of  condemnation.  His  end 
was  the  direct  denouement  of  a  course  to  which 
he  was  compelled  by  his  own  "  demons''  which 
represented  to  him  his  highest  ideals  of  truth 
and  honor  and  righteousness.  Around  him  as 
he  fell  lay  strewn  the  wreck  of  his  political  for- 
tunes, and,  it  is  said,  of  the  hard-won  earnings 
of  "a  busy  life."  His  beloved  home  was 
broken  up  by  the  death,  before  his  own  failing 


298  HORACE   GREELEY. 

eyes,  of  the  wife  who  had  shared  his  aspirations 
and  endeavors  for  more  than  thirty-six  years. 
There  is  reason  to  think  that  he  already  had  a 
foretaste  of  the  different  relation  which  he  could 
not  have  helped  sustaining  toward  the  Tribmie 
itself,  which  was  being  rescued  by  other  hands 
out  of  the  peril  and  depletion  to  which  his  later 
career  had  led  it. 

But  it  was  not  the  tragedy  of  failure  in  the 
only  real  sense, — where  a  man  has  failed  in 
courage,  integrity,  and  self-devotion,  or  in 
steadfast  heed  to  the  divine  voice,  which  asked  : 
"  For  what  is  a  man  profited  if  he  gain  the 
whole  world,  and  lose  or  forfeit  his  own  soul  ?" 


CHAPTER    XIX. 

HOME   LIFE   AND   TRAVEL. 

It  was  not  Horace  Greeley's  lot  to  ascend 
"  from  the  log-cabin  to  the  White  House," 
nor  even  to  the  brown-stone  front.  But  both 
the  beginning  of  his  life  under  the  humble  pa- 
rental roof,  and  its  later  years  under  his  own, 
amid  all  their  drawbacks,  and  his  intermediate 
experiences  of  a  long  and  dreary  boarding- 
house  existence,  enabled  him  to  taste  the 
sweetness  of  what  he  loved  to  call  "  that  dear 
hut,  my  home."  Notwithstanding  his  tem- 
porary phantasy  about  the  phalanstery,  no 
man  ever  more  thoroughly  appreciated,  both 
objectively  and  subjectively,  the  home  life. 
He  met  his  future  wife  at  Dr.  Graham's  board- 
ing-house, in  New  York,  and  was  married  in 
1836.  During  the  next  six  years  they  lived 
within  a  stone's  throw  of  the  City  Hall,  in 
order  to  be  convenient  to  his  business,  except 
a  brief  period,  in  which  they  strayed  as  far 
north  as  Broome  Street.  After  the  disappoint- 
ing Presidential  election  of  1844,  Mr.  Greeley 
— '*  worn  out  by  anxiety  and  effort,  and  thor- 
oughly used  up" — turned  with  longing  to  the 


300  HORACE    GREELEY. 

thought  of  a  suburban  home,  and  accordingly 
selected  an  old  neglected  and  somewhat  decayed 
country  seat  at  Turtle  Bay  on  the  East  River, 
nearly  opposite  the  southernmost  point  of 
Blackwell's  Island,  comprising  eight  acres  of 
land,  with  shade  and  fruit-trees,  shrubbery,  gar- 
den, and  a  wooded  ravine.  It  was  reached  from 
the  old  "  Boston  (or  Harlem)  Road"  at  Forty- 
ninth  Street,  by  a  narrow  and  devious  lane  a 
quarter  of  a  mile  long  and  very  dark  at  night. 
It  was  profoundly  quiet  and  secluded,  and  was 
connected  with  "  down-town"  by  an  hourly 
stage  on  the  Third  Avenue.  Margaret  Fuller, 
who  soon  became  one  of  the  household,  thus  de, 
scribes  it  :  **  The  house,  old-fashioned  and  of 
mellow  tint,  fronts  on  a  flower  garden  filled  with 
shrubs,  large  vines,  and  trim  box  borders.  On 
both  sides  are  beautiful  trees,  standing  fair, 
full-grown,  and  clear.  Passing  through  a  wide 
hall  you  come  out  upon  a  piazza  stretching  the 
whole  length  of  the  house,  where  one  can  walk 
in  all  weathers  ;  and  thence,  by  a  step  or  two, 
on  a  lawn,  with  picturesque  masses  of  rocks, 
shrubs,  and  trees,  overlooking  the  East  River. 
Gravel-paths  lead  by  several  turns  down  the 
steep  bank  to  the  water's  edge,  where  around 
the  rocky  point  a  small  bay  curves,  in  which 
boats  are  lying  ;  and,  owing  to  the  currents  and 
the  set  of  the  tide,  the  sails  glance  sidelong, 
seeming  to  greet  the  house  as  they  sweep  by. 


HOME    LIFE   AND   TRAVEL.  30 1 

The  beauty,  seen  by  moonlight,  is  truly  trans- 
porting." 

It  is  restful  to  our  thought  and  sympathies, 
as  it  was  to  his  own  weary  and  heavy-laden  body 
and  spirit,  to  follow  this  overwrought  man  out 
of  the  burden  and  battle  of  public  life  into 
these  cool,  sequestered  scenes — so  different 
from  the  clanging  and  crowded  down-town 
streets  that  at  first  the  intense  silence  made 
him  sleepless — the  dark  lane,  the  gentle  ripple 
of  the  river  on  the  bank,  the  serene  moonlight 
on  the  water  and  the  lawn  and  among  the 
shadows  of  the  trees,  the  glimpses  of  the  glid- 
ing, white-sailed  craft,  and  the  Sabbath  rest 
amid  the  sacred  silence  or  the  choral  innocence 
of  the  groves. 

Seven  years  later  he  purchased  a  farm,  or 
rather  the  rugged  and  wooded  ends  of  two 
farms,  in  Westchester  County  on  the  Harlem 
Railroad,  where  it  crosses  a  small  mill-stream, 
known  by  its  Indian  name  of  Chappaqua  Creek. 
He  apologizes  for  his  choice  of  "a  rocky, 
wooded  hillside,  sloping  to  the  north  of  west, 
with  a  bog  at  its  foot,"  by  the  difficulty  of  find- 
ing elsewhere  a  piece  of  land  near  the  city 
combining  Mrs.  Greeley's  three  prerequisites — 
"  a  peerless  spring  of  pure,  soft,  living  water, 
a  cascade  or  brawling  brook,  and  woods  largely 
composed  of  evergreens. "  His  own  satisfaction 
in  his  tinkling  brook,  his  dozen  or  more  springs, 


302  HORACE    GREELEV. 

and  his  woods — "  the  pride  of  the  farm"  and 
covering  at  least  twenty-five  of  his  seventy-five 
acres — is  undisguised.  The  woodman's  spirit 
and  habit  of  his  youth  came  out  in  his  almost 
chuckling  enumeration  of  the  various  kinds  of 
trees  and  shrubs,  only  two  of  which  were  un- 
familiar to  him  at  his  coming.  His  hands  soon 
itched  with  the  old  wood-chopper's  feeling, 
and  henceforth  he  had  at  least  one  resemblance 
to  the  "  grand  old  man"  of  Hawarden.  When- 
ever he  could  spare  a  Saturday  he  tried  to  give 
a  good  part  of  it  to  his  patch  of  forest.  "  I 
am  a  poor  chopper,"  he  says,  "  yet  the  axe  is 
my  doctor  and  delight.  Its  use  gives  the  mind 
just  enough  occupation  to  prevent  its  falling 
into  revery  or  absorbing  trains  of  thought, 
while  every  muscle  of  the  body  receives  sufifi- 
cient,  yet  not  exhausting,  exercise.  If  every 
youth  and  man,  from  fifteen  to  fifty  years 
old,  could  wield  an  axe  two  hours  per  day, 
dyspepsia  would  vanish  from  the  earth,  and 
rheumatism  become  decidedly  scarce.  I 
wish  all  our  boys  would  learn  to  love  the 
axe. 

His  "house  in  the  woods,"  which,  though 
small  and  hastily  erected,  he  persisted  in  call- 
ing "  my  house"  long  after  its  desertion  for  a 
more  commodious  and  better  built  dwelling  on 
the  edge  both  of  the  farm  and  of  the  village, 
was  his  retreat  where  he  kept  his  books  and 


HOME    LIFE   AND    TRAVEL.  303 

treasures,   and  received  his  friends  only  as  he 
saw  fit  to  be  "  at  home"  to  them. 

Those  who  wish  to  read  one  of  the  most  de- 
lightful chapters  in  autobiography  will  find  his 
account  of  his  **  farming" — his  tree-planting, 
his  evergreen  hedge,  his  greenhouse  and  gar- 
den, his  orchards,  his  crops,  his  stubborn 
swamp,  his  wonderful  barn — all  lovingly  dwelt 
upon  in  the  "  Recollections."  His  early  and 
hereditary  turn  for  farming  reasserted  itself,  so 
that  he  could  say,  as  he  looked  over  his  re- 
claimed swamp  with  its  crop  of  flax,  "  All  else 
that  I  have  done  may  be  of  no  avail,  but  what 
I  have  done  here  is  done;  it  will  last."  He 
never  tired  of  Chappaqua,  nor  did  his  wife, 
who  spent  far  more  of  her  time  there.  "  I 
think  we  all,"  he  said,  "as  we  grow  old,  love 
to  feel  and  know  that  some  spot  of  earth  is 
peculiarly  our  own — ours  to  possess  and  to 
enjoy,  ours  to  improve  and  to  transmit  to  our 
children."* 

*  On  April  3d,  1890,  the  Greeley  homestead  at  Chappa- 
qua was  destroyed  by  fire.  Miss  Gabrielle  Greeley,  the  only 
surviving  member  of  Horace  Greeley's  family,  has  made  this 
place,  so  associated  with  the  busy  and  unselfish  life  of  her 
father,  her  home,  and  has  endeared  herself  to  the  people  of 
all  the  country  round,  so  that  when  the  news  of  the  fire 
spread,  every  one — man,  woman,  and  child — did  everything 
to  save  the  house.  Only  a  few  articles  were  saved — a  number 
of  books  out  of  the  remains  of  the  vast  library,  Mr.  Greeley's 
chair  and  desk,  and  a  little  furniture — but  the  unpretentious 


304  HORACE    GREELEY. 

It  must  be  confessed  that  neither  husband 
nor  wife  (devoted  as  they  were  to  home  and  to 
each  other)  were  endowed  with  that  peculiarly 
home-making  quality  which  adds  so  largely  to 
the  domestic  felicity  of  many  lives.  Mrs. 
Greeley  was  a  much  more  consistent  disciple 
of  Graham  than  he,  and  for  years  "  kept^her 
house  in  strict  accordance  with  her  convic- 
tions." He  naively  describes  the  effect  of  her 
housekeeping,  for  which  she  never  even  deigned 
an  explanation  to  her  friends  and  relatives  who 
visited  or  temporarily  sojourned  with  them  : 
"  As  politeness  usually  repressed  complaint  or 
inquiry  on  their  part,  their  first  experiences  of 
a  regimen  which  dispensed  with  all  they  deemed 
most  appetizing  could  hardly  be  observed  with- 
out a  smile.  Usually  a  day,  or  at  most  two, 
of  beans  and  potatoes,  boiled  rice,  puddings, 
bread  and  butter,  with  no  condiment  but  salt, 
and  never  a  pickle,  was  all  they  could  abide  ; 
so,  bidding  her  a  kind  adieu,  each  in  turn  de- 
parted to  seek  elsewhere  a  more  congenial  hos- 
pitality." Even  Margaret  Fuller,  who  was  su- 
premely contented  at  their  house,  spoke  of  it 
as  "  kept  in  a  Castle  Rackrent  style."  It  was, 
according  to  her  description,  full  of  affection 

little  house  and  much  that  will  be  deplored  by  students  of 
American  life,  are  gone,  together  with  several  trunks  con- 
taining some  manuscripts,  and  the  letters  received  from 
prominent  men  all  over  the  world. 


HOME   LIFE   AND    TRAVEL.  305 

and  hospitality ;  but  the  mistress  had  been 
a  typical  Yankee  schoolmadam,  **  crazy  for 
knowledge"  and  with  little  taste  or  training  for 
the  prosaic  and  material  part  of  domestic  life. 
And  yet  it  is  into  that  home  life  that  we 
must  peep  in  order  fully  to  appreciate  the  ten- 
der side  of  Horace  Greeley's  nature.  With 
delicacy  he  lifts  a  little  corner  of  his  heart's 
tenderest  and  saddest  experiences  in  the  chapter 
of  his  "  Recollections"  which  he  entitles  "  My 
Dead."  There  is  no  elegiac  prose  in  our  lan- 
guage more  touching  than  the  words  with 
which  he  tells  the  story  of  the  death  of  five  of 
his  children  out  of  seven,  especially  of  his  pride 
and  darling,  "  Pickie, "  who  died  in  his  seventh 
year.  "  Pickie"  was  thoroughly  human, 
though  full  of  wise  and  deep  sayings,  a  conver- 
sationalist who  drew  many  to  the  house,  as 
well  as  charmed  admiring  circles  outside.  He 
must  have  been  a  boy  of  striking  loveliness,  as 
attested  by  this  tribute  :  "I  looked  in  vain 
through  Italian  galleries,  two  years  after  he 
was  taken  from  us,  for  any  full  parallel  to  his 
dazzling  beauty — a  beauty  not  physical  merely, 
but  visibly  radiating  from  the  soul.  His  hair 
was  of  the  finest  and  richest  gold  ;  *  the  sun- 
shine of  picture  '  never  glorified  its  equal  ;  and 
the  delicacy  of  his  complexion  at  once  fixed 
the  attention  of  observers  like  the  late  N.  P. 
Willis,   who  had  traversed    both    hemispheres 


306  HORACE    GREELEY. 

without  having  his  gaze  arrested  by  any  child 
who  could  bear  a  comoarison  with  this  one." 
He  died  of  cholera  in  the  summer  of  1849, 
being  ill  only  from  one  to  five  o'clock  of  "  one 
of  the  hottest,  and  quite  the  longest  day  I 
have  ever  known. "  How  many,  alas  !  will  un- 
derstand this  experience  with  which  the  father, 
after  nearly  twenty  years,  closes  his  narrative  : 
**  When  at  length  the  struggle  ended  with  his 
last  breath,  and  even  his  mother  was  convinced 
that  his  eyes  would  never  again  open  on  the 
scenes  of  this  world,  I  knew  that  the  summer 
of  my  life  was  over,  that  the  chill  breath  of  its 
autumn  was  at  hand,  and  that  my  future  course 
must  be  along  the  downhill  of  life." 

Surely  this  glimpse  of  Horace  Greeley,  as 
the  early  brightness  passed  that  day  from  his 
rugged  and  struggling  path  at  the  very  meridian 
of  his  life,  and  that  other  spectacle  as  we  last 
see  him  sitting,  haggard  and  worn  and  heart- 
broken, at  the  deathbed  of  the  wife  of  his 
youth,  may  well  cause  many  of  us  to  revise 
our  estimate  of  the  man,  and  to  cherish  a  less 
harsh  or  unrelenting  judgment  of  those  things 
in  his  outward  intercourse  and  his  public  life 
which  may  have  irritated  and  prejudiced  us. 

It  is  pleasant  to  think  that,  during  the  last 
thirty  years  of  his  life,  Horace  Greeley  enjoyed 
a  number  of  "  outings"  which  refreshed  and 


HOME    LIFE   AND   TRAVEL.  307 

invigorated  both  mind  and  body, — we  do  not, 
of  course,  include  his  hurried  lecture  tours  all 
over  the  country,  not  so  much  snatched  from 
his  other  duties  as  added  to  and  mingled  with 
them,  though  these  were  a  fruitful  source  of 
profit  both  to  himself  and  his  readers,  and  a 
partial  variation  of  his  incessant  employment. 
Some  of  his  sketches  of  adventure  and  misad- 
venture In  these  tours  are  exceedingly  entertain- 
ing, and  Illustrate  the  well-earned  wages  of  a 
lecturer  in  that  ante-railroad  day  across  the 
Alleghanies,  over  the  prairies,  and  even  **  Down- 
East,"  amid  floods  and  snow-storms,  corduroy 
roads,  break-neck  haste  to  perform  miracles  of 
rapid  transit,  and  not  infrequent  delay  and 
failure  in  reaching  appointments,  not  to  speak 
of  damp  beds  and  ruinous  diet.  I  cannot  un- 
dertake to  reproduce  his  travels,  of  which  ex- 
tensive memoranda  have  been  left  to  us  ;  but 
only  In  the  briefest  manner  to  recapitulate  the 
most  important  of  his  tours  and  excursions, 
and  at  the  same  time  illustrate  the  man  by  his 
way  of  looking  at  distant  places  and  people, 
leaving  to  conjecture  what  may  have  been  the 
effect  of  these  experiences  and  observations 
upon  the  development  of  his  own  character  and 
opinions.  Meanwhile  we  take  occasion  to  say 
that  the  sketches  which  he  has  left  of  his  travels 
are  by  no  means  obsolete,  but  richly  repay 
reading,  as  not  only  vivid  pictures  of  the  time, 


308  HORACE   GREELEY. 

but  as  mirrored  in,  and  mirroring,  one  of  the 
keenest  and  most  independent  observers  of  any 
age. 

His  earliest  recorded  tour  was  taken  in  1842, 
the  year  after  the  founding  of  the  Tribune^  one 
of  his  chief  objects  being  to  visit  the  haunts  of 
his  youth  and  the  present  home  of  his  parents 
in  Pennsylvania.  The  trip  took  him  to  Wash- 
ington for  the  first  time,  where  his  published 
criticism  of  distinguished  men  was  often  more 
acute  than  complimentary.  At  Mount  Vernon 
he  came  fully  under  the  spell  of  the  "  solemn 
and  sublime  repose  of  the  mighty  dead."  At 
Niagara  he  records  this  bit  of  autobiographic 
reminiscence  :  "  Years,  though  not  many,  have 
weighed  upon  me  since  first,  in  boyhood,  I 
gazed  from  the  deck  of  a  canal-boat  upon  the 
distant  cloud  of  white  vapor  which  marked 
the  position  of  the  world's  great  cataract,  and 
listened  to  catch  the  rumbling  of  its  deep 
thunders.  Circumstances  did  not  then  permit 
me  to  gratify  my  strong  desire  of  visiting  it  ; 
and  now,  when  I  am  tempted  to  wonder  at 
those  who  live  within  a  day's  journey,  yet  live 
on  through  half  a  century  without  one  glance 
at  the  mighty  torrent,  I  am  checked  by  the  re- 
flection that  I  myself  passed  within  a  dozen 
miles  of  it  no  less  than  five  times  before  I  was 
able  to  enjoy  its  magnificence." 

In  the  spring  of  1847  ^^  took  a  trip  to  Lake 


HOME   LIFE   AND   TRAVEL.  309 

Superior  to  inspect  some  mining  property  in 
which  he  had  invested,  and  from  which  all  he 
ever  reah'zed  was  experience  and  "  the  convic- 
tion that  '  big  strikes  '  are  as  one  to  a  million." 
Chicago  was  then  "  a  smart  and  growing  vil- 
lage ;"  Milwaukee  consisted  of  "  some  three 
to  four  hundred  new  houses,  clustered  about  a 
steamboat-landing  at  the  mouth  of  a  shallow 
and  crooked  creek  ;"  "no  mile  of  railroad  ter- 
minated in  Chicago."  On  his  return  he  took 
boat  from  that  place  to  New  Buffalo  (then  de- 
signed to  be  the  terminus  of  the  Michigan  Cen- 
tral Railroad)  ;  stage  to  Kalamazoo,  where  he 
struck  a  just  completed  section  of  the  railroad, 
which  carried  him  to  Detroit  ;  and  thence 
homeward  by  steamboat  to  Buffalo,  railroad  to 
Albany,  and  steamboat  to  New  York. 

In  1859  h^  took  a  "  journey  of  observation" 
to  California,  on  his  own  account,  with  refer- 
ence to  a  Pacific  railroad  which  had  been 
clearly,  ever  since  the  gold  discoveries  of  1848, 
"a  national  necessity,"  and  an  "imperative 
and  inevitable"  fact  of  the  near  future.  He 
started  alone  on  May  9th,  and  travelled  rapidly 
via  Cleveland,  Chicago,  Quincy,  and  the  North 
Missouri  Railroad  to  St.  Joseph,  thence  drop- 
ping down  the  Missouri  to  Atchison,  and  tra- 
versing Kansas  by  Leavenworth  and  Wyandot 
to  Osawatomie  ;  thence  visiting  Lawrence  and 
returning  to  Leavenworth,  whence  the  Pike's 


3IO  HORACE   GREELEY. 

Peak  stage  carried  him  through  Topeka  and 
Fort  Riley,  to  Junction  City,  then  the  Western 
outpost  of  civilization  in  that  quarter. 

We  give  his  **  descending  ladder  of  civiliza- 
tion     : 

May  \2tJi,  Chicago, — Chocolate  and  morning 
journals  last  seen  on   the  hotel  breakfast-table. 

23^,  Leavenworth. — Room-bells  and  bath- 
tubs make  their  final  appearance. 

24/A,  Topeka. — Beef-steaks  and  wash-bowls 
(other  than  tin)  last  visible.      Barber,  ditto. 

26//^,  Manhattan. — Potatoes  and  eggs  last 
recognized  among  the  blessings  which  "  bright- 
en as  they  take  their  flight."     Chairs,  ditto. 

2"] thy  Junction  City. — Last  visitation  of  a 
boot-black,  with  dissolving  views  of  a  board 
bedroom.      Beds  bid  us  good-by. 

The  narrative  of  his  ride  across  the  plains  to 
Denver  is  exceedingly  graphic  and  interesting, 
and,  with  all  his  records  of  travel  in  those  pio- 
neer days,  will  become  more  and  more  valuable 
as  the  wilderness  blossoms  and  brings  forth 
great  cities  and  States  in  the  coming  years. 
Denver  was  then  about  six  months  old,  with 
perhaps  a  hundred  dwellings  of  hewn  cotton- 
wood  logs  without  ground  floors,  and  averaging 
ten  feet  square.  The  inhabitants  were  almost 
entirely  males  ;  the  food  was  mainly  bread, 
bacon,  beans,  coffee,  and  nettles,  the  last  being 
boiled  for  greens,  while  "  those  who  were  not 


HOME   LIFE  AND   TRAVEL.  311 

particular  as  to  diet  could  often  buy  a  quarter 
of  antelope"  brought  in  by  an  Indian  ;  whiskey, 
of  course,  was  plentiful  at  a  quarter  of  a  dollar 
per  glass.  Bedsteads  were  rare  conveniences, 
one  of  them  nearly  breaking  his  back  by  rough 
slats  nearly  a  foot  apart.  The  air  was  vocal 
with  the  curses,  quarrelling,  and  revolvers  of 
the  blacklegs  and  ruffians.  Being  "  shy  by 
nature  and  meditative  by  habit,"  Mr.  Greeley 
avoided  the  "  hotel,"  preferring  to  study  West- 
ern character  out  of  pistol-shot,  and  sought 
seclusion  in  a  deserted  cabin,  taking  his 
meals  at  another  cabin  occupied  by  a  widow, 
whose  menage  is  thus  described  :  "  She  and 
her  little  son  slept  on  a  sort  of  shelf  nearer  the 
roof  than  the  floor  of  her  single  room  ;  while 
two  male  boarders,  waiting  outside  while  she 
made  her  toilet,  spread  their  blankets  on  the 
earth-floor  of  her  tenement.  At  daylight  they 
turned  out,  giving  her  a  chance  to  dress,  clear 
up,  and  get  breakfast,  which  they  duly  returned 
to    eat.     Such   was   life    in    Denver    in    June, 

1859." 

He  rode  thence  in  an  "ambulance"  (or 
wagon  with  four  mules)  on  the  Overland  Mail 
Route  to  Fort  Laramie,  seeing  only  four  huts 
on  the  way,  only  one  of  them  occupied.  There 
was  no  white  person  living  within  fifty  miles 
of  Cheyenne.  Thus  traversing  the  old  Oregon 
and  California  emigrant  trail  through  the  South 


312  HORACE   GREELEV. 

Pass  of  the  Rocky  Mountains,  he  burst  upon 
*'  the  city  of  the  many- wived  prophet,  the 
capital  of  his  sacerdotal  and  political  empire, 
and  the  most  conspicuous  trophy  of  his  genius 
and  his  power."  Salt  Lake  City  restored  him 
to  comfort  and  digestion.  His  impression  of 
the  Mormons  was  highly  favorable,  their  uni- 
form industry  naturally  commending  them  to 
his  mind,  which  regarded  idleness  as  the 
source,  if  not  the  sum,  of  all  villainies  ;  they 
were  also  "  more  pious  (after  their  fashion) 
than  any  other  people  I  ever  visited."  At 
Camp  Floyd  he  dined  with  Albert  Sidney 
Johnston,  the  commander  of  the  post — "  a 
grave,  deep,  able  man,  with  a  head  scarcely 
inferior  to  Daniel  "Webster's" — whose  death 
years  after  on  the  battlefield  of  Shiloh  may 
have  materially  changed  the  fortunes  of  the 
rebellion. 

We  cannot  further  trace  his  journey  to  and 
across  the  Sierra  Nevada,  the  Yosemite  Valley 
and  its  then  virgin  wonders  (than  which  he  had 
seen  ten  years  later  "  nothing  at  all  compar- 
able in  awe-inspiring  grandeur  and  sublimity"). 
The  Big  Trees  of  California,  of  course,  claimed 
his  special  attention.  At  last  our  pilgrim  ar- 
rived at  San  Francisco,  worn  out  with  his  jour- 
ney over  arid  stretches  of  desert,  and  sick  with 
"  ancient  pork  and  hot  saleratus  bread,"  and 
the  "  unwholesome  and  detestable  warm  alka- 


HOME   LIFE   AND   TRAVEL.  313 

line  water"   with  which  he  had  been  forced  to 
wash  it  down. 

Horace  Greeley's  first  visit  to  Europe  was  in 
185 1,  chiefly  to  see  the  World's  Fair  at  Lon- 
don, of  which  he  was  the  representative  of  the 
United  States  as  chairman  of  a  jury — that  em- 
bracing the  general  and  extensive  department 
of  "  hardware."  His  voyage  in  the  Baltic  was 
a  rough  and  rainy  one,  and  revealed  the  fact 
that  he  was  almost  as  bad  a  sailor  as  his  friend 
Henry  Ward  Beecher.  He  was  "  sick  unto 
death's  door  for  most  of  the  time."  The  sea 
was  always  an  "unloving  acquaintance,"  and 
a  sea  voyage  of  twelve  days  "  about  equal  to 
two  months'  hard  labor  in  the  State  prison  or 
to  the  average  agony  of  five  years  on  shore." 
.  .  .  "he  who  shall  teach  us  to  vanquish  sea- 
sickness will  deserve  to  be  honored  and  crowned 
as  one  of  the  greatest  benefactors  of  the  hu- 
man race."  The  sights  of  London  which 
chiefly  impressed  him  were  the  fogs  ("  the 
thing  called  sun  in  England,  when  seen,  bear- 
ing a  nearer  resemblance  to  a  boiled  turnip  than 
to  its  American  namesake"),  the  fuss  and  fol- 
lies of  court  etiquette,  and  the  sickening  sight 
of  want  and  degradation.  This  latter  made 
him  feel  that  he  had  hitherto  "  said  too  little, 
done  too  little,  dared  too  little,  sacrificed  too 
little,    to    awaken    attention    to   the    infernal 


314  HORACE   GREELEY. 

wrongs  and  abuses  which  are  inherent  in  the 
very  structure  and  constitution,  the  nature  and 
essence,  of  civilized  society  as  it  now  exists 
throughout  Christendom." 

Among  the  notable  men  with  whom  he  was 
thrown  in  London  were  Lord  Canning,  Presi- 
dent of  the  Council  of  the  Exposition,  and  after- 
ward Governor-General  of  India  during  the 
Sepoy  Rebellion,  the  Duke  of  Argyle,  and  the 
great  Duke  of  Wellington.  During  that  sum- 
mer Mr.  Greeley  found  time  for  a  hasty  run 
through  France,  Italy,  Belgium,  and  a  corner 
of  Germany  ;  also  a  trip  northward  to  Scotland 
and  Ireland.  He  "  did"  Paris  in  eight  days, 
spending  two  of  them,  however,  among  the 
pictures  of  the  Louvre  ;  so  also  at  Rome  the 
larger  part  of  his  time  was  spent  in  the  art  gal- 
leries, his  pleasure  being  tempered  only  by  the 
thought  of  the  vastly  greater  good  which  might 
be  accomplished  by  the  diffusion  of  all  that 
wealth  of  beauty.  He  was  pleased  with  the 
French,  and  thought  the  future  of  the  Repub- 
lic assured  (it  was  only  a  few  months  before 
the  usurpation  of  Louis  Napoleon).  He  found 
"  aristocracy  a  chronic  disease  nowhere  except 
in  England."  In  Ireland  he  found  a  girl  of 
ten  years  breaking  up  stones  of  the  brook 
for  roads,  at  the  rate  of  sixpence  a  cart-load, 
which  took  her  a  fortnight.  This  was  a  typi- 
cal   incident    of    his    impressions,    which    he 


HOME   LIFE  AND   TRAVEL.  315 

closes  with  the  words,   **  Alas  !  unhappy  Ire- 
land." 

It  was  during  this  visit  to  London  that  Mr. 
Greeley  was  invited  before  a  Committee  of 
Parliament,  of  which  Richard  Cobden  was 
chairman,  to  give  testimony  concerning  the 
newspaper  press  of  America,  the  subject  be- 
fore them  being  the  repeal  of  the  stamp  duty 
of  a  penny  on  every  copy  of  a  newspaper,  and 
of  the  tax  on  advertisements.  This  testimony, 
which  was  evidently  striking  and  impressive  as 
well  as  influential,  is  given  at  length  in  Hud- 
son's "Journalism  in  America,"  as  "  an  interest- 
ing part  of  the  history  of  the  American  Press." 

Again,  in  1855,  Mr.  Greeley  went  to  Europe 
v/ith  his  family,  visiting  the  second  World's 
Exposition  at  Paris.  The  six  weeks  spent  in 
that  city  he  pronounced,  in  1868,  "  the  nearest 
approach  to  leisure"  he  had  known  for  thirty 
years.  Again,  the  art  exhibition  in  Paris  espe- 
cially interested  him,  and  nothing  so  impres- 
sively as  the  pre-Raphaelite  school  of  Holman 
Hunt,  Millais,  and  others.  Parisian  life,  how- 
ever, he  is  sure  would  not  be  the  thing  either 
for  his  health  or  his  happiness.  He  had  no 
envy  for  "  the  pleasure-seeker  who  chases  his 
nimble,  coquettish  butterfly,  year  in  and  year 
out,  along  the  boulevards  and  around  the 
*  places  '  of  the  giddy  metropolis  of  France." 


3l6  HORACE   GREELEY. 

An  amusing  episode  of  his  Parisian  visit  is 
entertainingly  told  in  a  chapter  of  his  "  Recol- 
lections" entitled,  "  Two  Days  in  Jail."  Some 
French  exhibitor  at  the  New  York  World's 
Fair  in  1852-53  took  occasion  to  serve  a  writ 
upon  him  one  evening,  in  which  he  was  sued  for 
$2500  as  a  director  of  the  Fair.  As  imprison- 
ment for  debt  was  still  the  law  in  France,  and 
as  his  prosecutor  would  not  accept  his  security, 
he  passed  the  night  in  Clichy  Prison  rather 
than  have  a  row  raised  about  it.  It  being 
Saturday  night,  he  could  not  be  released  on 
legal  showing  till  IMonday  morning,  and  as  he 
refused  to  be  bailed  or  bought  out,  he  suffered 
his  "  durance  vile"  w^ith  his  characteristic  pa- 
tience, which  was  so  marked  on  real  provoca- 
tions and  so  lacking  on  slight  ones.  Sunday  was 
quite  a  brilliant  reception  day — among  his  sym- 
pathizing visitors  being  the  American  Ambas- 
sador, John  Y.  Mason,  Don  Piatt,  Secretary 
of  Legation,  Mrs.  Piatt,  Mr.  Greeley's  own 
family,  Mr.  Maunsell  B.  Field,  M.  Vattemare, 
and  M.  Hector  Bossange,  the  publisher.  Hon. 
E.  B.  Washburne,  afterward  Minister  to  France 
during  the  siege  of  Paris  in  the  Franco-German 
War,  was  also  at  his  side.  His  release  was 
obtained  through  regular  process  of  law  on 
Monday  morning,  it  being  demonstrated  to 
the  court  that  he  could  not  be  held  liable  for 
the  damage  sustained  by  the  exhibitor,  backed 


HOME    LIFE   AND   TRAVEL.  317 

by  the  representation  that  the  Americans  were 
generally  indignant  at  the  outrage,  and  were 
threatening  to  leave  Paris  in  a  body  if  he  were 
not  promptly  liberated.  So  he  went  back  to 
his  rented  cottage,  where  he  was  met  at  the 
door  by  his  little  son,  who  rushed  down-stairs 
with  flying  hair  and  radiant  face,  and  who  now 
kneiv  what  he  had  been  told  at  the  jail  on  the 
day  before  and  had  bravely  tried  to  believe. 

Horace  Greeley's  account  of  his  Swiss  jour- 
neys I  happened  to  read  at  the  same  time  as 
those  of  John  Ruskin  in  his  autobiography, 
"  Prseterita. "  The  contrast  of  those  aspects 
of  scenery  which  attracted  the  two  strongly 
marked  men,  and  of  their  methods  of  express- 
ing themselves,  is  an  interesting  psychological 
study.  Never  was  there  so  strange  a  mixture 
as  in  the  former,  of  sentiment,  enthusiasm,  and 
rhetoric,  with  agricultural  and  Census  Bureau 
material.  **  He  had,"  says  Mr.  Parton,  "an 
eye  for  a  picture  and  a  prospect  as  well  as  for  a 
potato-field  and  a  subsoil  plough."  He  actu- 
ally did  make,  as  one  of  his  first  observations  in 
Italy,  the  remark  that  "  he  had  never  seen  a  re- 
gion where  a  few  subsoil  ploughs,  with  men 
qualified  to  use  and  explain  them,  were  so 
much  wanted." 

Mr.  Greeley's  letters,  like  all  his  writings,  were 
always  acute  as  well  as  refreshingly  readable  ; 


3l8  HORACE   GREELEY. 

yet  it  is  due  to  him  to  add  his  own  modest 
apology  for  them  :  "  I  doubt  not  that  my  let- 
ters abounded  in  blunders  and  gaucheries,  which 
a  riper  knowledge,  a  better  preparation  for  for- 
eign travel,  would  have  taught  me  to  avoid. 
As  it  was,  I  wrote  for  a  circle  of  readers  of 
whom  many  were  glad  to  look  through  my  eyes 
because  they  ivcre  mine, — that  is,  because  they 
were  interested  in  knowing  how  Europe  would 
impress  me,  and  what  I  should  find  there  to 
admire  or  to  condemn.  Had  not  this  been 
the  case — had  I  addressed  readers  to  whom  I 
w^as  unknown  or  indifferent — I  could  not  have 
deemed  my  letters  worth  their  attention,  nor 
likely  to  attract  it." 


CHAPTER    XX. 

FRIENDS   AND  CO-LABORERS. 

A  MAN  of  such  multifarious  and  public  pur- 
suits as  Horace  Greeley,  and  a  leader  in  them 
all,  could  not  fail  to  draw  around  him  a  very 
large  circle  of  acquaintance  and  coadjutors. 
He  was  probably  the  best  known  man  of  his 
time  in  New  York,  if  not  throughout  the  coun- 
try. He  was  accessible  to  everybody,  free  and 
easy  in  approaching  everybody,  and  had  a 
good  memory  for  faces,  names,  and  associa- 
tions. His  connection  with  politics  and  re- 
forms, as  both  a  spokesman  and  a  moulder  of 
opinion,  made  him  a  centre  of  counsel  and  in- 
quiry. His  position  as  an  editor  and  journalist 
led  to  his  employment,  first  and  last,  of  a 
small  army  of  co-laborers  and  assistants.  His 
living  so  much  in  the  street  and  on  the  high- 
ways of  the  land  as  a  lecturer,  campaign  speak- 
er, and  a  restless  leader  and  indefatigable 
worker,  gave  him  an  enormous  acquaintance. 
And  acquaintance  to  him  meant  familiarity, 
and  the  utmost  directness  and  unconvention- 
ality   of   intercourse.     He  rarely  stopped   for 


320  HORACE   GREELEY. 

preliminaries,  but  blurted  out  the  thing  which 
was  uppermost  in  his  mind,  or  as  if  resuming  a 
conversation  just  interrupted  for  a  moment. 
Mr.  Barnum  narrates  the  circumstance  of  meet- 
ing Mr.  Greeley  as  he  passed  the  door  of  his 
museum,  after  his  own  absence  of  nearly  two 
years  in  Europe,  and  of  extending  his  hand  in 
great  joy  to  greet  him  ;  but  the  movement  re- 
ceived no  attention,  and,  as  if  they  had  parted 
only  the  day  before,  he  opened  the  conversa- 
tion with  a  remark  about  an  incidental  matter 
which  had  mutually  concerned  them  at  their 
last  meeting  as  directors  of  the  World's  Fair. 
He  troubled  himself  very  little  with  "  Mister- 
ing" people,  but  called  them  by  their  simple 
surnames,  after  the  manner  of  school-fellows. 
He  was,  however,  usually  a  genial  and  refresh- 
ing companion,  with  a  joke  or  an  anecdote  al- 
ways ready.  His  dry  humor  was  as  marked  as 
Abraham  Lincoln's,  and  he  told  his  "  little 
story"  with  a  glee  and  enjoyment  as  great  as 
his  auditor's.  His  richly-stored  memory  and 
vast  and  varied  information  made  his  talk  as 
instructive  as  it  was  entertaining.  He  man- 
aged to  read  all  the  books  of  the  day,  and  could 
talk  with  intelligence  and  acumen  about  them. 
To  enjoy  him  one  must  not  expect  or  attempt 
**  small  talk,"  or  mind  the  utmost  bluntness. 
He  could  not  flatter,  if  he  had  tried  ;  and  he 
never   did    try.      He  could  approach  a  noted 


FRIENDS  AND   CO-LABORERS.  32 1 

poetess  with  the  words,    "  Mrs.  ,  I   have 

just  read  a  criticism  on  your  writings  in  which 
you  are  greatly  overrated  ;"  and  could  reply 
to  another,  who  had  asked  whether  he  had  read 
her  last  poem,  "  Madam,  do  you  call  that  a 
poem  ?"  And  yet,  somehow,  he  carried  with 
him  such  an  impression  of  simplicity  and  sin- 
cerity, and  the  absence  of  any  design  to  wound 
the  feelings,  that  he  was  usually  taken  in  good 
part. 

He  keenly  relished  the  company  of  a  few 
congenial  friends  amid  pleasant  talk,  reminis- 
cence, badinage,  anecdote — an  hour  or  cwo  of 
unrestrained  intercourse — when  he  could  find 
time  for  it.  One  of  the  most  intimate  of  these 
has  recorded  that  **  it  was  a  special  pleasure  to 
him  to  slip  off  with  a  friend  to  a  quiet  dinner 
in  a  quiet  place  after  the  bulk  of  his  day's  work 
was  done  (if  it  were  ever  done),  and  abandon 
himself  for  awhile  to  the  novelty  and  luxury  of 
having  nothing  to  do.  Then  he  was  the  most 
charming  of  companions,  full  of  geniality, 
brightness,  and  humor,"  a  capital  listener,  as 
well  as  talker,  to  those  having  anything  to  say. 
He  was  extremely  fond  of  a  game  of  euchre,  as 
he  had  been  of  checkers  in  his  youth.  In 
fact,  he  played  with  the  relish  of  a  boy,  for  hours 
at  a  time,  and  with  great  glee  when  he  could 
come  off  best.  Of  one  of  his  fellow-workers, 
who  had  produced  an  especially  brilliant  edi- 


322  HORACE   GREELEY. 

torial,  he  said  :  "  F can  write  better  than 

I  can,  but  I  can  beat  him  playing  euchre  !" 

And  yet  Horace  Greeley  seems  to  have  had 
few  intimate  and  confidential  friends,  such  as 
Goethe  and  Bunsen  and  Agassiz  had.  In  fact, 
he  had  not  a  genius  for  friendship  as  distinct 
from  companionship.  And  the  secret  is  easy 
to  find,  not  in  a  shallowness  of  nature,  much 
less  a  selfish  indifference,  but  in  an  expansive- 
ness  of  passion  and  of  interest  which  caused 
him  to  give  his  intensest  devotion  to  man  rather 
than  men,  to  society  rather  than  individuals. 
He  was  too  tremendously  in  earnest  for  human 
improvement  and  social  reform,  to  live  for  per- 
sons as  the  "  lover  and  friend"  must  do.  Be- 
yond a  certain  point  of  earnestness  in  philan- 
thropy we  display  the  paradox  of  egotism.  He 
was  of  too  masterful  a  nature  and  too  regard- 
less of  the  small,  sweet  courtesies  of  life,  too 
impatient  of  contradiction  or  delays,  to  trans- 
form co-laborers  into  friends,  though  there  were 
marked  differences  among  them  in  this  re- 
spect ;  in  fact,  these  traits  in  too  many  in- 
stances transformed  them  into  his  worst  en- 
emies. 

It  was  in  the  sphere  of  his  association  with 
those  who  co-operated  with  him  that  both  his 
best  and  worst,  his  strongest  and  weakest 
points  of  character  showed  themselves.  While 
some  of  these,  like  Mr.  McElrath,  George  Rip- 


FRIENDS   AND   CO-LABORERS.  323 

ley,  Bayard  Taylor,  James  S.  Pike  and  others, 
seem  to  have  enjoyed  uninterrupted  relations 
of  love  and  peace,  others  became  bitterly  alien- 
ated. He  could  hardly  be  called  a  "  true 
yokefellow,"  but  had  always  a  bit  of  the  old 
oxen-driver  of  Vermont,  visiting  upon  the  cat- 
tle somewhat  of  the  impatience  due  to  the 
stumps  which  he  was  striving  to  plough  up. 
Independent  and  rival  spirits  like  Raymond 
and  Dana  could  not  endure  to  purchase  peace 
at  the  cost  of  subordination  and  submission,  or 
at  least  of  disregarding  and  humoring  the  en- 
forcer of  those  virtues.  And  yet  he  was  no 
more  exacting  of  others  than  of  himself.  He 
shared  their  impecuniousness  in  the  day  of 
small  things,  and  cordially  acquiesced  in,  and 
even  recommended  their  leaving  for  other  es- 
tablishments when  they  could  do  better.  I 
find  in  all  his  relations  with  his  employes  noth- 
ing mean  or  selfish,  as  Henry  J.  Raymond  and 
some  of  his  friends  seemed  determined  to  im- 
pute to  him.  He  was  doubtless  thoughtless 
and  short-sighted  in  letting  men  drudge  for 
him  for  inadequate  reward,  just  as  he  felt  him- 
self wronged  by  those  who  accepted  his  politi- 
cal drudgery  without  decent  recognition.  His 
own  unselfish  and  unworldly  enthusiasm  made 
the  mistake  of  expecting  the  same  disinter- 
estedness from  his  subordinates  and  co-laborers 
as  from  himself.     Perhaps  he  was  not  as  care- 


324  HORACE   GREELEY. 

ful  to  show  his  appreciation  of  good  work,  as 
he  was  outspoken  and  impatient  of  bad — a  too 
common  fault.  But  we  have  on  record  enthu- 
siastic outbursts  expressing  his  sense  of  work 
by  Whitelaw  Reid,  W.  H.  Fry,  Charles  A. 
Dana,  George  Ripley,  Margaret  Fuller,  and 
others  of  that  extraordinary  group  of  persons 
whom  he  seemed  to  have  a  peculiar  faculty  of 
drawing  about  him,  though  not  always  the 
same  happy  faculty  of  retaining.  It  is  remark- 
able how  many  of  these  men  made  their  begin- 
ning with  him,  were  discovered  by  him,  and 
were  advanced  to  high  and  effective  positions, 
not  seldom  at  his  own  loss.  I  used  constantly 
in  my  college  days  to  hear  the  praises  of  Hor- 
ace Greeley  chanted  by  a  companion  who  had 
been  picked  out  by  him  from  the  very  dust  and 
door-sill  of  the  Tribune  ofifice  in  his  boyhood, 
and  put  in  the  path  of  self-improvement  and 
advancement  in  journalism,  till  now  he  ranks 
among  our  most  respected  and  influential  citi- 
zens. 

So  far  as  we  can  ascertain,  Mr.  Greeley's  rare 
personal  friendships  were  illustrated  by  his  re- 
lations to  his  pastor,  the  Rev.  Dr.  E.  H. 
Chapin,  of  New  York,  with  whom  his  inter- 
course was  entirely  unreserved  and  unprofes- 
sional ;  Henry  Ward  Beecher,  with  whom  he 
had  much  in  common  in  largeness  of  nature, 
independence  of  mind,   and  in  tenderness  of 


FRIENDS   AND    CO-LABORERS.  325 

heart  ;  and  P.  T.  Barnum,  whose  ecclesiastical 
associations  brought  them  much  into  contact, 
and  whose  oddities  and  self-control  and  practi- 
cal kindliness  must  have  made  his  society  a  re- 
freshment to  one  so  nervous,  and  so  alive  alike 
to  the  humorous  and  the  kindly.  Barnum's 
introduction  to  him  was  the  result  of  an  offer 
of  Greeley  to  bet  on  an  election,  at  the  same 
time  borrowing  the  money  to  do  so.  "  From 
that  time,"  says  the  genial  showman,  "  Mr. 
Greeley  and  I  became  warm  personal  friends." 
The  interview  took  place,  by  the  way,  in  the 
office  of  the  Christia?i  Messe^iger,  the  organ  of 
their  religious  denomination.  It  illustrates 
Greeley's  keen  interest  in  politics  as  a  game, 
for  we  have  no  indication  of  a  gambling  spirit, 
much  less  of  greed  to  make  politics  lucrative 
in  any  way.  It  illustrates  also  how  far  his 
ideas  of  morality  had  relaxed  from  the  Scotch- 
Irish  and  Puritan  standards  of  his  ancestry. 
It  is  curious  to  think  what  the  great  mass  of 
his  rural  constituents  of  that  day  would  have 
thought  of  this  bet,  as  of  his  profanity  and 
other  peccadilloes. 

His  relations  with  Margaret  Fuller  deserve 
special  mention,  he  having  himself  devoted  a 
whole  chapter  of  his  **  Recollections"  to  her. 
She  was  first  brought  to  his  attention,  and  ulti- 
mately to  a  place  in  his  household  and  a  posi- 
tion on  the   Tribune,  by  the  partiality  of  his 


326  HORACE    GREELEY. 

wife,  who  had  met  her  in  Boston.  He  consid- 
ered her  at  that  time  "  the  best  instructed 
woman  in  America"  and  "  physically  one  of 
the  least  enviable — a  prey  to  spinal  affection, 
nervous  disorder,  and  protracted,  fearfully  tor- 
turing headaches."  He  always  vividly  re- 
membered his  first  half  hour's  conversation 
with  this  extraordinary  improvvisatrice.  Her 
appearance  was  unprepossessing,  and  even  re- 
pelling, so  that  he  said  to  himself,  **  We  shall 
never  get  far."  He  says  :  '*  I  believe  I  fancied 
her  too  much  interested  in  personal  history  ; 
and  her  talk  was  a  comedy  in  which  dramatic 
justice  was  done  to  everybody's  foibles.  I  re- 
member that  she  made  me  laugh  more  than  I 
liked,  for  I  was  at  that  time  an  eager  scholar 
of  ethics,  and  had  tasted  the  sweets  of  solitude 
and  stoicism,  and  I  found  something  profane 
in  the  hours  of  amusing  gossip  into  which  she 
drew  me  ;  and  when  I  returned  to  my  library 
had  much  to  think  of  the  crackling  of  thorns 
under  a  pot."  Another  thing  which  was  hard 
for  him  to  palliate  was  her  bondage  to  moods 
and  nerves,  so  that  she  was  incapable  of  inces- 
sant or  even  regular  labor.  She  did  not  come 
up  to  his  conception  of  a  strong-minded  woman, 
and  an  assertor  of  woman's  rights.  She  re- 
quired attendance  and  care.  **  She  would  evi- 
dently have  been  happier  amid  other  and  more 
abundant   furniture  than  graced  our  dwelling  ; 


FRIENDS   AND   CO-LABORERS.  327 

and,  while  nothing  was  said,  I  felt  that  a  richer 
and  more  generous  diet  than  ours  would  have 
been  more  accordant  with  her  tastes  and 
wishes." 

But  erelong  he  learned  to  appreciate  not 
only  her  intellectual  superiority,  her  magnetic 
attraction  for  those  of  her  own  sex,  and  the 
almost  universal  confidence  which  low  and  high 
reposed  in  her.  She  won  his  heart  by  her  love 
and  helpfulness  to  his  darling  "Pickie." 
Above  all,  he  found  her  a  kindred  spirit  in  her 
sympathy  with  social  reform,  and  in  her  per- 
sonal endeavor  to  befriend  and  uplift  the  very 
outcasts  of  society.  In  concluding  his  fine 
tribute  to  her  memory,  by  an  account  of  her 
tragic  and  self-devoted  death,  he  says  :  "  So 
passed  away  the  loftiest,  bravest  soul  that  has 
yet  irradiated  the  form  of  an  American  wom- 
an." On  the  other  hand,  she  gave  not  only 
her  admiration  to  Mr.  Greeley,  but  her  per- 
sonal affection.  **  I  like  him,  nay  more,  love 
him.  He  is,  in  his  habits,  a  plebeian  ;  in  his 
heart,  a  nobleman.  His  abilities,  in  his  own 
way,  are  great.  He  believes  in  mine  to  a  sur- 
prising extent.     We  are  true  friends." 

Mr.  Greeley's  relations  with  the  two  maiden 
sisters,  Alice  and  Phoebe  Gary,  was  an  inter- 
esting one.  He  was  a  frequent  visitor  at  their 
humble  though  hospitable  home — one  of  the 
chief  lions  of  their  modest  salon.     He  was  al- 


328  HORACE    GREELEY. 

ways  gentle  and  kindly  and  helpful  to  them. 
He  was  one  of  the  pall-bearers  at  the  funeral 
of  Alice,  who  was  the  most  prolific  writer  of 
the  two,  though  for  a  long  time  a  suffering  in- 
valid. Phoebe  was  four  years  and  a  half 
younger,  but  died  within  a  few  months  of  her 
sister.  She  did  not  write  as  much,  perhaps 
because  she  was  the  Martha  of  the  little  house- 
hold, and  her  poems,  though,  perhaps,  more 
original  and  spirited  than  Alice's,  were  never 
quite  as  popular.  Mr.  Greeley  was  prepared 
for  the  death  of  the  elder  sister,  saying  as  he 
stood  by  her  coffin  (she  was  then  fifty-one  years 
old)  :  "  Alice  has  lived  to  a  reasonable  age  ; 
it  is  about  the  proper  time  for  her  to  die."  At 
Phoebe's  funeral,  however,  he  was  not  at  all  re- 
signed. "  Now,  that  girl,"  he  said,  "  had  full 
twenty-five  years  more  in  her  ;  she  had  no  busi- 
ness to  die  at  this  time  of  life.  There  is  some- 
thing about  it  I  cannot  understand."  It  was 
the  final  breaking  up  of  one  of  the  few  spots 
on  earth  where  love  and  gentle  forbearance 
always  awaited  him,  and  where  his  tired  spirit 
could  rest. 

Mr.  Greeley  was  peculiarly  fortunate  in  his 
relations  with  his  business  partner,  Mr.  Mc- 
Elrath,  who  took  Greeley's  cares  entirely  from 
his  shoulders,  and  never  criticised  him  for  what 
he  must  often  have  regarded  as  extravagance 
or  bad  policy.     They  have  been  called  the  Da- 


FRIENDS  AND    CO-LABORERS.  329 

mon  and  Pythias  of  a  perfect  partnership,  and 
Mr.  Parton  says,  amid  the  many  discordant 
unions  of  the  world,  "  Oh,  that  every  Greeley 
could  find  his  McElrath  !  and  blessed  is  the 
McElrath  that  finds  his  Greeley  !" 

Somewhat  the  same  testimony  is  given  of 
Mr.  George  M.  Snow,  a  genial  and  gentlemanly 
man  of  Mr.  Greeley's  own  age,  who  conducted 
the  financial  department  for  more  than  twenty- 
two  years  from  the  beginning,  when  his  health 
failed.  Mr.  Parton  describes  him  as  an  ele- 
gant and  rather  distingtid  gentleman,  with  a 
small  black  Albert  mustache.  Old  Solon  Rob- 
inson is  picturesquely  sketched  as  "  like  a  good- 
humored  prophet  Isaiah,  or  a  high-priest  in  un- 
dress," compiling  a  column  of  paragraphs  on 
the  drought  and  the  potato  crop. 

Among  the  many  journalists  of  eminence 
who  were  employed  and  developed  by  the 
Tribune  were  such  names  as  Ripley,  Dana, 
Raymond,  Parton,  Park  Benjamin,  Bayard 
Taylor,  George  W.  Smalley,  Zebulon  White, 
W.  H.  Fry,  John  Russell  Young,  J.  R.  S. 
Hassard,  Sidney  Howard  Gay,  James  S. 
Pike,  Junius  Henri  Browne,  Colonel  John 
Hay,  Whitelaw  Reid,  William  Winter,  Solon 
Robinson,  F.  J.  Ottarson,  R.  H.  Hildreth, 
George  M.  Snow,  G.  G.  Foster,  Joseph  How- 
ard, Amos  Gumming,  Theodore  Tilton,  Charles 
Nordhoff,  George  W.  Bungay,  Albert  Richard- 


330  HORACE   GREELEY, 

son,  Fanny  Fern,  and  Margaret  Fuller.  Messrs. 
Dana,  Gay,  Young,  and  Reid  were  successively 
the  managing  editors  ;  Messrs.  Smalley,  Tay- 
lor, White,  and  Howard  have  been  conspicu- 
ous as  correspondents  ;  Messrs.  Hassard,  Fry, 
and  Winter  have  been  art  critics.  Robinson 
was  agricultural  editor,  Ottarson  the  city  edi- 
tor, and  Snow  commercial  editor  ;  Parton  was 
an  "  inspired  reporter"  and  Mr.  Greeley's  biog- 
rapher, and  Raymond  was  probably  the  most 
versatile  and  effective  journalist  ever  connected 
with  the  New  York  press. 

George  Ripley  was  the  "  father  of  literary 
criticism  in  the  American  press."  He  intro- 
duced real  reviewing  as  distinguished  from  the 
*'  book  notice,"  but  with  a  combination  of  the 
scholarly  and  popular  which  had  not  yet  been 
attempted.  He  gave  his  whole  energy  to  it, 
and  made  an  era  in  the  literary  part  of  journal- 
ism. So  wide  and  catholic  and  learned  was  his 
mind  that  his  reviews  extended  over  all  depart- 
ments, from  religion,  philosophy,  science,  and 
politics  to  history,  biography,  poetry,  and  fic- 
tion. His  patience  was  inexhaustible  ;  his 
persistency  was  prodigious.  He  would  sit  in 
his  chair  all  day  long,  reading  and  writing,  un- 
conscious of  fatigue,  insensible  to  annoyance, 
heedless  even  of  interruption,  never  complain- 
ing of  over-pressure,  piercing  the  heart  of  a 
volume  with  a  glance,  and  throwing  off  page 


FRIENDS   AND    CO-LABORERS.  33 1 

after  page  of  manuscript  with  an  ease  of  touch 
which  betokened  the  trained  mind  as  well  as 
the  practised  hand.  "  Anything  but  apathy," 
was  his  motto.  He  certainly  was  not  domi- 
nated by  "  filthy  lucre."  His  salary  at  first 
(1849)  ^^'^s  only  five  dollars  a  week,  was  raised 
to  ten  dollars  in  the  latter  part  of  that  year, 
and  was  fixed  at  twenty-five  dollars  in  185 1, 
where  it  continued  till  1 861.  That  year  he  re- 
ceived thirty  dollars,  and  from  January,  1866, 
to  1871,  the  sum  of  fifty  dollars,  and  thence  till 
his  death  seventy-five  dollars  a  week.  He  is 
described  as  "  a  stout  gentleman  of  eight-and- 
forty,  of  sound  digestion  and  indomitable  good- 
humor,  who  enjoys  life  and  helps  others  enjoy 
it,  and  believes  that  anger  and  hatred  are  sel- 
dom proper  and  never  '  pay.'  "  His  relations 
with  Mr.  Greeley  were  of  the  most  uniform 
harmony,  friendship,  and  mutual  apprecia- 
tion ;  and  his  tributes,  both  in  the  press  and 
on  the  platform,  to  his  old  leader  are  among 
the  most  loving  as  well  as  discriminating  that 
we  have. 

Mr.  Bayard  Taylor  owed  his  start  in  life  and 
literary  fame  to  Mr.  Greeley's  employment  of 
him,  then  a  type-setter,  at  a  good  price  for  his 
**  Views  Afoot,"  though  he  was  obliged  to 
sometimes  supplement  his  pay  by  working  at 
his  trade  on  the  way.  Mr.  Taylor  was  more 
or  less  connected  with  the  Tribune  during  his 


332  HORACE    GREELEY. 

life,  and  was  one  of  Mr.  Greeley's  closest 
friends  among  his  co-laborers.  He  thus  ap- 
pears in  the  editorial  rooms  of  the  Tribune  in 
1854  :  "  His  countenance  has  quite  lost  the 
Nubian  bronze  with  which  it  darkened  on  the 
banks  of  the  White  Nile,  as  well  as  the  japan- 
ning which  his  last  excursion  gave  it.  Pale, 
delicate-featured,  with  a  curling  beard  and  a 
subdued  mustache,  slight  in  figure,  and  dressed 
with  care,  he  has  little  the  aspect  of  an  adven- 
turous traveller,  and  as  much  the  air  of  a  nice 
young  gentleman  as  can  be  imagined.  He 
may  read  in  peace,  for  he  is  not  now  one  of 
the  hack-horses  of  the  daily  press." 

Mr.  William  H.  Fry,  besides  being  an  exten- 
sive writer  and  authorized  critic  on  music — 
having  composed  the  rather  successful  opera  of 
Leonora — was  accounted  the  **  sledge-ham- 
mer," thunderer,  and  sham-demolisher  of  the 
editorial  columns.  Mr.  Parton  describes  him 
as  "a  tall,  pale,  intense-looking  gentleman," 
thinking  out  his  work  as  he  slowly  paced  the 
editorial  sanctum  ;  "  one  of  the  noblest  fellows 
alive,  a  hater  of  meanness  and  wrong,  a  lover 
of  man  and  right,  with  a  power  of  expression 
equal  to  the  intensity  of  his  hate  and  the  en- 
thusiasm of  his  love. ' '  The  same  graphic  hand 
gives  us  a  pen-picture  of  Mr.  Charles  A.  Dana, 
the  managing  editor  :  "  In  figure,  face,  and 
flowing  beard,  he  looks  enough  like  Louis  Kos- 


FRIENDS   AND    CO-LABORERS.  333 

suth  to  be  his  cousin,  if  not  his  brother.  As 
befits  his  place,  he  is  a  gentleman  of  peremp- 
tory habits.  It  is  his  office  to  decide  ;  and  as 
he  is  called  upon  to  perform  the  act  of  decision 
a  hundred  times  a  day,  he  has  acquired  the 
power  both  of  deciding  with  despatch  and  of 
announcing  his  decision  with  civil  brevity.  If 
you  desire  a  plain  answer  to  a  plain  question, 
Charles  A.  Dana  is  the  man  who  can  accom- 
modate you.  He  is  an  able  and,  in  descrip- 
tion, a  brilliant  writer,  a  good  speaker,  fond 
and  proud  of  his  profession,  indefatigable  in 
the  discharge  of  its  duties  ;  when  out  of  har- 
ness, agreeable  as  a  companion  ;  in  harness,  a 
man  not  to  be  interrupted." 

Mr.  Dana  appears  first  as  an  active  and  resi- 
dent member  of  the  Brook  Farm  Community. 
On  its  failure,  both  he  and  Ripley  naturally 
drifted  into  the  Tribune,  about  1846.  He  took 
part  in  the  foreign  department  at  twelve  dollars 
a  week,  being  an  accomplished  linguist,  and  of 
large  acquaintance  with  European  events  and 
movements.  It  was  at  this  time  that  the  two 
men  jointly  edited  for  the  Appletons  The 
New  American  Cyclopcedia.  Erelong  Dana  was 
made  managing  editor,  and  his  services  were 
highly  appreciated,  and  regarded  as  almost  in- 
dispensable by  Mr.  Greeley.  In  1848  he  went 
to  Ireland  to  study  and  write  letters  upon  the 
disorders  and   revolution   there.     During   Mr. 


334  HORACE    GREELEY. 

Greeley's  canvass  for  United  States  Senator, 
Mr.  Dana  went  to  Albany  to  electioneer  for 
his  chief. 

These  two  decided  men  got  on  together  with 
considerable  friction  at  times,  and  with  no 
small  exercise  of  forbearance  on  Mr.  Dana's 
(and  perhaps  on  Mr.  Greeley's)  part,  till  their 
differences  concerning  the  war  policy  of  the  Ad- 
ministration brought  about  a  rupture  in  1862, 
resulting  in  Dana's  withdrawal  and  appointment 
as  Assistant  Secretary  of  War  under  Stanton. 
Whatever  alienation  or  rivalry  may  have  ex- 
isted during  Mr.  Greeley's  life,  it  is  evident 
that  these  men  thoroughly  prized  each  other  ; 
and  no  estimates  of  the  Tribune  editor,  since 
his  death,  have  been  more  appreciative  as  well 
as  discriminating  than  that  of  the  editor  of  the 
Sun.  And  there  have  been  recent  indications 
that  time  and  the  silence  of  separation  have 
greatly  softened,  if  not  obliterated,  in  the  sur- 
vivor's mind  the  traces  of  that  later  severance 
from  the  friend  and  co-laborer  of  early  days. 

Mr.  Dana,  in  1867,  tells  of  his  introduction 
to  Henry  J.  Raymond  more  than  twenty  years 
before  **  in  a  lumbered  and  dusty  attic,  No.  30 
Ann  Street,  New  York,"  that  attic  being  the 
editorial  ofifice  of  the  TribunCy  and  Mr.  Greeley 
being  the  introducer.  He  well  remembered 
that  first  meeting.  "  We  sat  down  together 
and  at  once  plunged  into  a  long  talk  on  Ger- 


FRIENDS  AND   CO-LABORERS.  335 

man  philosophy  and  metaphysics,  for  we  were 
both  younger  and  nearer  our  college  days  at 
that  time  than  we  are  at  present."  In  fact, 
Mr.  Raymond  was  just  out  of  college,  when, 
in  1840,  he  called  upon  Horace  Greeley,  for 
whose  New  Yorker  he  had  already  written 
some  noticeable  sketches.  He  was  glad  to  ac- 
cept the  post  of  assistant  editor  of  the  New 
Yorker  on  a  salary  of  eight  dollars  a  week,  with 
the  understanding,  on  Mr.  Greeley's  part,  that 
he  need  only  retain  it  till  he  could  get  some- 
thing better.  Indeed,  Raymond  had  offered  to 
give  his  attendance  at  the  office  to  be  of  any 
service,  and  did  so,  until  a  considerable  amount 
of  literary  and  miscellaneous  work  fell  into  his 
swift  and  skilful  hands.  In  three  weeks'  time  his 
value  had  been  discovered,  and  the  eight  dollars 
was  offered  to  slightly  outbid  an  offer  of  $400  a 
year  for  school-teaching  in  the  South.  So  low 
were  the  Tribune' s  resources  at  the  time,  that 
nothing  but  a  sense  of  the  young  man's  indis- 
pensableness  could  have  induced  so  prodigal 
an  offer.  When  Mr.  Greeley  established  the 
Tribujie,  in  1841,  Raymond  was  carried  over 
into  the  first-assistant  editorship  as  a  matter  of 
course  and  of  seeming  necessity.  In  his 
"  Recollections"  Mr.  Greeley  pays  this  tribute 
to  his  young  co-laborer,  which  that  gentleman 
pronounced  as  "  especially  grateful,"  and  as 
"  generous  appreciation"  :   "  I  had   not  much 


33^  HORACE   GREELEY. 

for  him  to  do  till  the  Tribune  was  started  ; 
then  I  had  enough  ;  and  I  never  found  another 
person,  barely  of  age  and  just  from  his  studies, 
who  evinced  so  signal  and  such  versatile  ability 
in  journalism  as  he  did.  Abler  and  stronger 
men  I  may  have  met  ;  a  cleverer,  readier,  more 
generally  efficient  journalist  I  never  saw. 
He  is  the  only  assistant  with  whom 
I  ever  felt  required  to  remonstrate  for  doing 
more  work  than  any  human  brain  and  frame 
could  be  expected  long  to  endure.  His  salary 
was,  of  course,  gradually  increased  from  time 
to  time  ;  but  his  services  were  more  valuable 
in  proportion  to  their  cost  than  those  of  any 
one  else  who  ever  aided  me  on  the  Tribune.'' 

It  was  in  the  latter  sentence  that  the  earliest 
alleged  grievance  of  Mr.  Raymond  was  after- 
ward declared  to  have  been, — that  advantage 
had  been  taken  of  his  modesty  and  disposition 
to  drudge,  and  that  the  propositions  to  ad- 
vance his  salary  were  left  to  his  own  initiative. 
This  is  certainly  not  in  accordance  with  Mr. 
Greeley's  nature,  nor  with  many  other  well- 
known  facts  of  his  relations  with  employes  ; 
and  yet  there  was  probably  a  lack  of  observa- 
tion and  of  consideration.  At  length  from 
overwork  (to  eke  out  his  living  by  extra  earn- 
ings) and  by  exposure  at  night  as  a  reporter, 
Raymond  fell  ill.  On  a  visit  from  his  employer 
he  was  asked,  **  When  will  you  be  well  enough 


FRIENDS   AND    CO-LABORERS.  337 

to  come  back?"  "Never,"  was  the  reply, 
**  on  the  salary  you  paid  me."  On  being  asked 
how  much  he  wanted,  he  named  twenty  dollars 
a  week,  which  was  rather  protestingly  granted. 
This  sort  of  transaction  seems  to  have  been  too 
often  rehearsed  in  dealing  with  employ6s.  The 
time  came — in  less  than  three  years — when 
Raymond  received  an  offer  from  the  Coiirier 
and  Enquirer y  which  Greeley  did  not  consider 
himself  able  to  afford,  and.therefore  generously 
acquiesced  and  even  recommended  his  trans- 
ference. 

He  was  now  thrown  into  a  totally  different 
and  bitterly  prejudiced  circle  of  journalism,  and 
was  speedily  set  up  to  combat  his  former  em- 
ployer in  a  personal  newspaper  duel  on  Fourier- 
ism.  Journalistic  rivalry  and  ambition  were 
stimulated,  and  he  was  drawn  under  political 
influences  which  saw  in  him  and  in  his  avail- 
ability the  material  to  replace  their  failing  hold 
upon  Mr.  Greeley  himself. 

We  do  not  propose  nor  desire  to  enter  into 
the  details  of  this  growing  alienation  and  bitter- 
ness. It  can  now  be  seen,  by  impartial  minds, 
to  have  been  due  to  incompatibility  of  the  men 
to  understand  or  make  allowance  for  one  an- 
other ;  to  their  paths  which  lay  directly  across 
each  other's;  to  the  inherent  weakness,  egotism, 
impatience,  and  uncharitableness  of  human  na- 
ture, and  the  "  whispering  tongues  that  poison 


338  HORACE    GREELEY. 

truth."  Both  Charles  A.  Dana  and  Henry  J. 
Raymond  were  as  masterful  and  independent 
men  as  Horace  Greeley.  The  latter  was  fitly 
styled  "  the  Little  Napoleon  of  the  Press"  in 
this  respect,  as  well  as  for  his  ambition.  Mr. 
Dana  was  too  different,  and  Mr.  Raymond  was 
too  hke  himself  to  be  compatible  with  him. 
There  were  certain  kinds  of  m.en,  in  fact,  with 
whom  he  could  not  get  on  ;  those  who,  being 
made  for  "  bosses"  themselves,  could  not  sub- 
mit to  it  in  others  ;  men  of  high  temper  hke 
himself ;  men  who  did  not  meet  his  candor, 
simplicity,  and  devotedness  with  a  like  return  ; 
and  men  whom  he  thought  wanted  to  use  him 
for  their  own  selfish  ends.  We  shall  see  some 
of  these  points  still  further  exemplified  pres- 
ently. Oh,  if  men  would  only  look  at  each  other 
in  the  heats  of  life  as  they  are  constrained  to  do 
in  the  shadow  of  death  !  The  following  was  the 
tribute  paid  to  Mr.  Raymond  in  the  Tribune  on 
the  morning  after  his  untimely  death  :  "  He 
was  often  misjudged.  .  .  .  Genial,  unas- 
suming, and  thoroughly  informed  by  study, 
observation,  and  travel,  Mr.  Raymond  was  a 
delightful  companion,  and  his  society  was 
widely  courted  and  enjoyed.  .  .  .  His  death 
makes  a  void  which  will  not  easily  be  filled." 

Horace  Greeley  had  only  two   political  loves 
in  his  life  (unless  we  include  his  * '  young  love's 


FRIENDS   AND    CO-LABORERS.  339 

dream"  for  the  brilliant  and  magnetic  William 
Wirt),  and  to  these  he  gave  an  enthusiasm  and 
devotion  rarely  equalled.  The  first  of  these — 
his  "  Harry  Clay" — we  have  already  spoken 
of.  In  one  of  his  lectures  he  styles  him  as 
"  the  eagle-eyed  and  genial-hearted  living 
master-spirit  of  our  time."  And  if  any  one 
image,  outside  of  his  boy  and  his  immediate 
family,  was  imprinted  on  his  heart  in  death,  it 
was  that  of  this  splendid  and  fascinating  man. 
Equally  loyal-hearted  and  almost  servilely  de- 
voted was  he  to  William  H.  Seward  during 
the  years  in  which  the  New  York  politician 
was  growing  up  to  the  stature  of  a  national 
statesman.  It  was  this  "  Seward"  clique 
which  had  given  him  his  first  start  in  journal- 
ism by  employing  him  for  campaign  papers, 
and  he  duly  appreciated  it.  For  nearly  twenty 
years  he  gave  his  utmost  toil  and  talents  to 
the  cause  which  they  led.  He  had  no  ambi- 
tion but  jMr.  Seward's  advancement  ;  he  had  no 
rule  but  Thurlow  Weed's  "advice."  Their 
affiliation  was  such  that  they  were  known  as 
the  firm  of  Seward,  Weed  &  Greeley.  But  the 
time  came  when  he  saw  (or  thought  he  saw) 
with  sudden  and  dazzling  clearness,  that  he 
was  dealing  with  selfish  and  crafty  men  who 
were  taking  advantage  of  his  single-mindedness 
and  enthusiasm  without  gratitude  or  apprecia- 
tion.    The  ox  was  expected  to  grind  in  the  mill 


340  HORACE    GREELEY. 

without  his  portion  of  the  meal.  Acknowl- 
edgments of  service  were  made  on  every  hand 
from  the  party  managers,  but  he  was  left  out, 
or  offered  what  it  was  a  humiliation  to  accept  ; 
and  he  expressed  his  hurt  and  humiliated  and 
long-repressed  feelings  in  a  letter  to  Seward  on 
November  nth,  detailing  his  grievances  and 
formally  dissolving  the  aforesaid  political  firm. 
This  letter  remained  private,  except  from 
Mr.  Seward's  particular  friends,  until  after  his 
defeat  for  the  Presidential  nomination.  At 
length  the  constant  and  virulent  attacks  of  the 
Courier  and  the  Times  became  so  full  of  charges 
and  insinuations  based  upon  it,  that  Mr. 
Greeley  demanded  its  publication.  A  reply 
was  published  by  Mr.  Weed  in  his  cool  and 
plausible  style,  in  which  he  attempts  but  slight 
denial  of  Mr.  Greeley's  allegations  of  neglect, 
but  expresses  the  utmost  amazement  that  he 
should  never  have  suspected  these  feelings  and 
aspirations  in  the  junior  member  of  the  firm, 
supposing  that  Horace  Greeley  cared  only  for 
journalistic  success  and  the  realization  of  his 
philanthropic  dreams, — a  thing  incredible  that 
the  contrary  should  not  have  suggested  itself 
to  such  students  of  human  nature  and  distrib- 
utors of  spoils,  at  least  so  far  as  to  lead  them 
to  ascertain  whether  any,  and  what,  favors 
would  be  congenial  and  gratifying.  He  is  cer- 
tain that  this  political  ambition  must  have  been 


FRIENDS   AND    CO-LABORERS.  34I 

a  plant  of  later  growth,  and  appeals,  as  it  were, 
from  Greeley  drunk  with  the  greed  of  spoils 
and  office  to  Greeley  the  whilom  babe  and 
philosopher,  **  far  above  the  *  swell-mob  '  of 
office-seekers."  At  any  rate,  the  mistake  was 
an  unfortunate  one  for  the  Warwick  of  Ameri- 
can politics,  who  could  make  any  one  else  the 
candidate  for  President,  except  the  one  man 
to  whose  elevation  his  life  was  devoted,  but 
whose  political  firm  was  not  only  "  dissolved," 
but  forever  bankrupt. 

Mr.  Greeley,  however,  insists  that  his  per- 
sonal relations  with  Mr.  Seward  were  wholly 
unchanged  by  it.  "  We  met  frequently  and 
cordially  after  it  was  written,  and  we  very 
freely  conferred  and  co-operated  during  the 
long  struggle  in  Congress  for  Kansas  and  free 
labor.  He  understood  as  well  as  I  did  that 
my  position  with  regard  to  him,  though  more 
independent  than  it  had  been,  was  nowise  hos- 
tile, and  that  I  was  really  as  ready  to  support 
his  advancement  as  that  of  any  other  states- 
man, whenever  my  judgment  should  tell  me 
that  the  public  guard  required  it."  Again,  he 
says,  in  1868  :  "  Apart  from  politics  I  liked  the 
man,  though  not  blind  to  his  faults.  His  nat- 
ural instincts  were  humane  and  progressive. 
Few  public  men  of  his  early  prime 
were  better  calculated  to  attract  and  fascinate 
young  men  of  his  own   party."      He  enumer- 


342  HORACE   GREELEY. 

ates  Seward's  faults  :  "  A  tendency  to  prodi- 
gality and  lavish  expenditure  in  government  ; 
a  rooted  dislike  to  opposing  a  project  or  bill 
whereby  any  of  his  attached  friends  are  to 
profit  ;  and,  conceited  as  we  all  are,  I  think 
most  men  exceed  him  in  the  art  of  concealing 
from  others  their  overweening  faith  in  their 
own  sagacity  and  discernment."  Mr.  Thur- 
low  Weed  is  described  as  "of  coarser  mould 
and  fibre, — tall,  robust,  dark-featured,  shrewd, 
resolute,  and  not  over-scrupulous,  keen- 
sighted,  though  not  far-seeing.  Writing  slowly 
and  with  difficulty,  he  was  for  twenty  years  the 
most  sententious  and  pungent  writer  of  edi- 
torial paragraphs  on  the  American  press.  In 
pecuniary  matters  he  was  generous  to  a  fault 
when  poor  ;  he  is  said  to  be  less  so  since  he 
became  rich,  but  I  am  no  longer  in  a  position 
to  know.  I  cannot  doubt,  however,  that  if  he 
had  never  seen  Wall  Street  or  Washington, 
had  never  heard  of  the  Stock  Board,  and  had 
lived  in  some  yet  undiscovered  country  where 
legislation  is  never  bought  or  sold,  his  life 
would  have  been  more  blameless,  useful,  and 
happy." 

But  these  are  not  pleasant  things  to  think 
about  such  men,  though  they  must  be  said  if 
we  would  be  true  to  these  men  as  they  were, 
or  as  they  looked  out  upon  one  another.  It  is 
the  part  of  eulogium  and  elegiac  verse  or  ora- 


FRIENDS   AND    CO-LABORERS.  343 

tory  to  present  ideals  ;  it  is  the  part  of  biog- 
raphy to  uncover  the  real,  concealing  naught, 
but  putting  down  naught  in  malice.  Let  us 
not  judge,  then,  but  content  ourselves  with 
setting  over  the  grave  of  our  hero  a  little 
signboard  with  these  two  warnings  :  (i)  Let 
the  shoemaker  stick  to  his  last,  and  the  editor 
stick  to  his  type  and  quill.  (2)  Defend  me 
from  my  friends  ;  I  will  defend  myself  from 
my  enemies. 


CHAPTER   XXI. 

PERSONAL   CHARACTERISTICS. 

Horace  Greeley  was  as  unique  and  un- 
conventional a  personality  as  Dr.  Johnson,  if 
not  Neander  and  John  Randolph,  alike  in  ap- 
pearance, manners,  habits,  and  qualities  of 
mind  and  character.  He  was  a  rough  block  of 
New  England  granite,  whose  shaping  was  that 
of  hard  knocks  rather  than  fine  chiselling,  and 
who  came  as  near  as  any  one  could  to  a  '*  self- 
made  man"  in  the  best  and  fullest  sense  of 
the  term.  In  early  boyhood  he  gave  the  same 
impression  of  abstraction  as  in  after  life, — rarely 
saluting  those  whom  he  met,  walking  for  miles 
along  the  zigzag  of  the  fences  without  once 
looking  up,  and  often  taken  by  strangers  for  a 
"  natural"  and  a  "tow-headed  fool."  Here 
is  the  description  of  him  by  an  eye-witness,  as 
he  came  to  Poultney  at  fifteen  years  of  age  : 
"  A  remarkably  plain-looking,  unsophisticated 
lad,  with  a  slouching,  careless  gait,  leaning 
away  forward  as  he  walked,  as  if  both  his  head 
and  his  heels  were  too  heavy  for  his  body.  He 
wore  on  the  back  of  his  head  a  wool  hat  of  the 


PERSONAL   CHARACTERISTICS.  345 

old  stamp,  with  so  small  a  brim  that  it  looked 
more  like  a  two-quart  measure  inverted  than  a 
hat.  His  trousers  were  exceedingly  short  and 
voluminous  ;  his  shoes  were  of  the  kind  called 
*  high-lows  '  and  much  worn  down  ;  he  wore 
no  stockings,  and  his  homespun  clothes  were 
cut  with  an  utter  disregard  of  elegance  or  fit, 
and  he  had  a  singular  whining  voice  that  pro- 
voked the  merriment  of  the  older  apprentices." 
His  voice  always  had  this  high  key  and  nasal 
tone,  though  the  habit  of  public  speaking  and 
the  giving  of  orders  to  other  men  developed  it 
into  a  clear  and  commanding  and  not  unpleas- 
ant quality.  The  boys  nicknamed  him  "  the 
ghost,"  m  allusion  to  his  long,  white  hair  and 
the  peculiar  fairness  of  his  complexion,  and 
they  played  all  manner  of  tricks  upon  him  in 
accordance  with  that  character. 

His  portraits  give  a  very  perfect  idea  of  his 
countenance,  especially  that  appended  to  his 
*'  Recollections"  from  a  photograph  by  Brady  ; 
Ritchie's  is  handsomer,  but  wears  an  un- 
wontedly  sour  expression.  His  face  was  a 
singularly  beautiful  one,  whether  for  his  deli- 
cacy of  feature,  or  the  habitual  look  of  purity 
and  kindliness  which  it  wore.  This  look  of 
simplicity  was  increased  by  his  habit  of  keep- 
ing his  eyes  partly  closed,  as  if  dazzled  by  the 
light,  the  conspicuousness  of  his  spectacles, 
and  the  whiteness  of  his  eyebrows,  which  made 


34^  HORACE    GREELEY. 

him  look  almost  as  if  he  had  none.  His  head 
was  bald  at  the  top,  but  his  face  was  encircled 
by  a  fringe  of  snow  (or  tow)  white  hair,  stand- 
ing to  all  quarters  of  the  compass,  and  chiefly 
exuberant  under  his  chin,  or  rather  on  his 
throat.  A  superficial  observer  might  call  his  a 
**  moon-face,"  but  a  closer  studv  would  find  in 
the  cut  of  the  nose,  the  set  of  the  mouth,  and 
the  very  close  of  the  eyes,  and  the  whole /^j^ 
of  the  face,  especially  when  looking  down  at  you 
on  addressing  him,  that  which  revealed  a  capac- 
ity for  almost  impudent  independence  and 
blunt  belligerency  ;  there  was,  too,  a  strange 
mingling  of  the  searching  and  shrewd  with  the 
far-away  and  childlike  in  his  look,  which  was  a 
dial-plate  of  the  man's  contrasted  traits.  So 
was  it  of  his  gait.  He  had  the  face  of  an  angel 
and  the  walk  of  a  clod-hopper.  Yet  it  was  not 
the  gait  of  mere  awkwardness,  much  less  of 
mental  vacancy.  He  seemed  to  be  working 
himself  along  by  his  shoulders,  and  in  a  side- 
long way,  as  a  determined  man  will  press  his 
way  through  a  crowd.  **  Near-sighted,  long- 
limbed,  with  head  and  members  that  seem  on 
ill  terms  with  the  main  body  to  which  they  be- 
long, his  shambling  gait  does  no  justice,  how- 
ever, to  the  philosopher." 

Though  I  had  no  personal  acquaintance  with 
Mr.  Greeley  in  my  youth,  I  saw  him  in  the 
Tribune  olifice  raising  a  dust  wherever  he  went 


PERSONAL   CHARACTERISTICS.  347 

in  his  tireless  industry  and  peering  oversight, 
bustling  about  on   election  night  as  the  very- 
genius   of   statistics,    sitting  at  his   dinner  at 
Windust's,     at    mass-meetings,     anniversaries, 
and   on   the   lecture  platform,   as  well   as   fre- 
quently on  the  streets,  where  his  presence  was 
felt  and  his  face  and  form  familiar  to  all  New 
Yorkers.     One  of  the  most  vivid  recollections 
of  those  days  was  my  meeting  him  at  the  most 
select  hour  of  the  afternoon  in^  Broadway  near 
Houston  Street,  which  was  then  the  most  cen- 
tral part  of  that  fashionable  promenade.      He 
was   pushing   and    shuffling   along  uptown — I 
think  on  the  wrong  side  of  the  pavement — in  his 
usual  r'g,  with  hat  on  the  back  of  his  head,  and 
pantaloon  legs  awry,   paying   no   attention   to 
anybody,   and  carrying  and   almost   trailing  a 
great  market  basket  in  his  hand.      I  presume 
he  was  hurrying  home  to  Chappaqua,  and  had 
bought  the  basket  on  his  way.      He  must  have 
presented  a  strange  figure  in  Europe,  particu- 
larly in  Paris.      Very  possibly  the  English  took 
him  for  the  typical  American  in  dress  and  man- 
ners, come  at  last  !     He  would  have  been  an 
odd  figure  in  the  White  House,  and  we  may 
conjecture  how  he  would  have  looked  and  acted 
in  the  seat  of  the  courtly  Washington,  or  the 
gracious  and   silvery-tongued   Van    Buren,    or 
the   reserved    and    dignified    Buchanan.     And 
we  should  not  fail  to  keep  in  view,  when  judg- 


348  HORACE    GREELEY. 

ing  the  apparent  neglect  of  his  political  friends 
to  put  him  in  high  office,  a  sense  of  incongruity 
which  they  may  almost  unconsciously  have 
felt,  and  a  secret  apprehension  lest  he  should 
give  in  courteous  and  ofificial  circles  a  certain 
scarecrow  effect,  or  prove  to  be  somehow  the 
bull  in  the  china  shop. 

Horace  Greeley's  dress  deserves  a  separate 
treatment.  In  his  village  life  in  Vermont  his 
wardrobe  in  summer  consisted  of  a  shirt  and 
trousers,  the  former  open  in  front  and  with 
tucked-up  sleeves,  and  the  latter  very  short. 
In  walking  the  streets  he  added  a  straw  hat, 
and  at  the  debating  society  he  put  on  a  jacket. 
When  he  came  to  New  York,  we  are  told  that 
men  stared  at  him  in  the  streets,  for  he  still 
wore  the  above  dress  or  want  of  dress,  until 
the  November  cold  compelled  him  to  "  turn 
over  a  new  leaf."  One  evening  he  appeared 
in  the  printing-ofifice  so  transmogrified,  that  his 
companions  did  not  at  first  recognize  him. 
They  saw  before  them  "  a  tall  gentleman 
dressed  in  a  complete  suit  of  faded  broadcloth, 
and  a  shabby,  over-brushed  beaver  hat,  from 
beneath  which  depended  long  and  snowy  locks  ; 
the  garments  were  fashionably  cut  ;  the  coat 
was  in  the  style  of  a  swallow's  tail  ;  the  figure 
precisely  that  of  an  old  gentleman  who  had 
seen  better  days.  It  was  a  second-hand  suit, 
worn    thin,    washed    in    blackened    water   and 


PERSONAL   CHARACTERISTICS.  349 

ironed  smooth,  bought  for  five  dollars  of  a  Chat- 
ham Street  Jew.  Horace  seemed  really  to  be 
vain  of  his  new  apparel. 

The  fact  is,  Horace  Greeley  had  no  sense  of 
dress,  and  seemed  unconscious  of  what  he 
wore  or  of  its  grotesque  and  abnormal  char- 
acter, and  his  attempts  to  improve  his  appear- 
ance were  quite  as  apt  to  impair  it,  and  make 
the  matter  worse.  Clothes  were  clothes  to 
him.  He  utterly  lost  sight  of  them  in  the 
men  underneath  them.  Clothes  could  not  be 
made  to  set  well  on  him, — what  with  his  break- 
down gait,  his  sidelong  walk,  and  the  way  of 
wearing  his  hat.  Prosperity  brought  no  real 
improvement.  He  paid  enough  for  dress,  but 
somehow  the  result  was  always  the  same  un- 
couth, ill-fitting,  and  shabby  effect.  It  puz- 
zled himself.  "  I  don't  see,"  he  exclaimed, 
after  the  above  incident  in  the  printing-ofifice, 
**  why  /  should  be  such  a  curious-looking  fel- 
low." He  really  believed  himself  a  very  well 
dressed  man,  and  that  few  men  of  his  station 
were  better  clad.  He  was  sensitive  on  the 
subject  of  dress,  and  was  twitted  all  his  life 
about  his  clothes.  His  sensitiveness  showed 
itself  on  one  occasion,  when  one  of  his  sub- 
editors suggested  a  change  in  his  necktie, 
which  was  one  of  his  weakest  points,  and  he 
turned  upon  his  critic  with  the  words  :  "  You 
don't  like  my  dress  and  I  don't  like  your  de- 


350  HORACE   GREELEY. 

portment.      If  you  have  any  improvements  to 
make,  please  begin  at  home." 

What  a  skilful  tailor  might  have  done  for 
Mr.  Greeley  we  should  not  undertake  to  say, 
but  he  seems  to  have  got  his  clothes  by  the 
pitchfork  method  out  of  a  heap  of  ready-made 
garments,  and  to  have  taken  whatever  was 
thrust  upon  him  ;  often  they  were  bought  for 
him  by  his  wife.  In  dres  ing  in  the  morning 
he  was  apt  to  put  on  whatever  came  first,  and 
a  friend  of  ours  who  occupied  a  neighboring 
room  has  testified  to  seeing  him  issue  forth 
with  his  cravat  tied  at  the  side  of  his  neck. 
He  wore  a  dress-coat  repeatedly  in  the  street 
of  a  morning,  and  appeared  in  any  kind  of 
vestment  at  formal  dinners.  He  had  no  more 
sense  of  comfort  than  of  taste  in  dress.  Mr. 
Barnum,  at  whose  house  he  stayed  for  some 
time,  noticed  that  he  wore  a  pair  of  thick-soled 
cowhide  boots,  and  begged  him  to  substitute  a 
pair  of  slippers  on  coming  in,  and  also  to  slip 
on  one  of  his  loose  dressing-gowns  ;  but  he 
seemed  quite  unable  to  see  the  advantage. 

There  have  been  attempts  to  deny,  or  greatly 
abate,  the  sartorial  defects  of  Horace  Greeley, 
but  the  testimonies  are  too  numerous  and 
unanimous.  Besides  my  own  vision  of  him  on 
Broadway,  a  clerical  friend  contributes  the  fol- 
lowing :  He  had  occasion  to  be  at  the  Bible 
House   in   New   York  at  some  gathering  one 


PERSONAL  CHARACTERISTICS.  35 1 

morning,  and  on  leaving  discovered  that  his 
hat  had  been  taken  and  another  left  in  its  place 
— a  badly  used  silk  high  hat,  with  the  rim 
turned  up  before  and  behind.  His  residence 
was  in  Jersey  City,  and  he  hesitated  for  some 
time  before  he  ventured  to  go  forth  on  his  way 
home.  But  haply  he  met  on  the  stairs  going 
down  a  white  hat  on  the  head  of  Horace 
Greeley,  who  then  must  have  had  a  room  in 
the  building,  while  he  worked  on  his  history  of 
the  Rebellion.  The  sight  of  it  reconciled  my 
friend  to  venture  over  the  river  v/ith  his  no 
more  disreputable  headpiece.  But  on  reaching 
his  house,  he  was  greeted  by  his  family  with  the 
general  chorus  :  "  Where  in  the  world  did  you 
get  that  hat  ?  You  look  like  a  Jew  peddler  !" 
Let  it  not,  however,  be  supposed  that  he 
was  anything  more  than  careless  in  the  choice 
and  hang  of  his  clothes.  He  was  scrupulously 
neat  in  his  habits,  and  had  a  passion  for  the 
bath.  His  linen  was  spotless,  his  cowhide  boots 
well  * '  shlned,"  his  face  carefully  shaven,  and  his 
hands  delicately  kept.  He  had  the  good  breed- 
ing never  to  speak  of  his  clothes  except  when 
stung  by  the  ill-breeding  of  others.  And,  above 
all,  it  was  a  cornerstone  in  his  social  platform  : 

"  What  tho'  on  hamely  fare  we  dine, 
"Wear  hodden-grey,  and  a'  that ; 
Gie  fools  their  silks,  and  knaves  their  wine, 
A  nian's  a  man  for  a'  that. 


352  HORACE    GREELEY. 

For  a'  that,  and  a'  that, 

Their  tinsel  show  and  a*  that : 

The  honest  man,  tho'  e'er  sae  poor, 
Is  king  o'  men  for  a'  that." 

Mr.  Greeley's  social  manners  were  the  em- 
bodiment of  gaucherie — as  ill-fitting  as  his 
clothes  and  as  uncouth  as  his  appearance.  It 
is  hard  to  tell  whether  he  most  gave  the  im- 
pression of  not  feeling  at  his  ease,  or  of  feeling 
too  much  at  his  ease, — probably  both  were  true 
of  him,  as  is  often  the  case.  His  general  de- 
meanor in  society  was  going  about  with  a  good- 
natured  stare,  like  a  rustic  in  a  country  fair. 
At  a  private  parlor-reading  of  a  beautiful  and 
accomplished  young  lady  of  our  acquaintance, 
he  made  his  appearance  in  the  midst  of  the 
performance,  pushed  his  way  to  the  front  and 
stood  during  the  entire  time  almost  under  her 
eyelids,  staring  straight  at  her  and  dividing  the 
attention  of  the  hearers,  if  not  embarrassing 
the  reader.  It  was  well  meant,  for  she  was  a 
great  favorite  of  his,  and  this  was  his  way  of 
showing  his  admiration  for  her  and  for  her 
talent. 

His  indifference  to  etiquette  seemed  at  times 
almost  like  defiance.  We  know  of  his  deliber- 
ately taking  off  his  boots  at  a  tea-party,  on 
arriving  out  of  the  rain,  and  putting  up  his 
blue  yarn  stockinged  feet  to  the  fender  to  dry. 
Mr.  Parton  tells  the  story  of  another  tea-party 


PERSONAL   CHARACTERISTICS.  353 

at  which  Mr.  Greeley  did  not  appear  till  after 
the  meal  was  over.  On  arriving  he  rushes  into 
a  discussion  on  the  topic  uppermost  in  his  mind 
— the  currency — utterly  ignoring  or  brushing 
aside  the  hostess's  repeated  appeals  to  him  to 
**take  some  tea."  **  Take  a  cruller,  any 
way,**  she  said,  handing  him  a  cake-basket  full 
of  those  peculiarly  hearty  and  indigestible  deli- 
cacies. Mr.  Parton's  account  is  too  graphic  to 
be  condensed  or  paraphrased.  * '  The  expound- 
er of  the  currency  dimly  conscious  that  a 
large  object  was  approaching  him,  puts  forth 
his  hands,  still  vehemently  talking,  and  takes 
not  a  cruller  but  the  cake-basket  and  deposits 
it  in  his  lap.  The  company  are  inwardly  con- 
vulsed, and  some  of  the  weaker  members  retire 
to  the  adjoining  apartment,  the  expounder 
continuing  his  harangue  unconscious  of  their 
emotion  or  its  cause.  Minutes  elapse.  His 
hands  in  their  wandering  through  the  air,  come 
in  contact  with  the  topmost  cake,  which  they 
take  and  break.  He  begins  to  eat  ;  and  eats 
and  talks,  talks  and  eats,  till  he  has  finished  a 
cruller.  Then  he  feels  for  another  and  eats 
that,  and  goes  on  slowly  consuming  the  con- 
tents of  the  basket  till  the  last  crumb  is  gone. 
The  company  look  on  amazed,  and  the  kind 
lady  of  the  house  fears  for  the  consequences. 
She  had  heard  that  cheese  is  an  antidote  to 
indigestion.      Taking   the    empty    cake-basket 


354  HORACE   GREELEY. 

from  his  lap  she  silently  puts  a  plate  of  cheese 
in  its  place,  hoping  that  instinct  will  guide  his 
hand  aright.  The  experiment  succeeds.  Grad- 
ually the  blocks  of  white,  new  cheese  disap- 
pear. She  removes  the  plate.  No  ill  conse- 
quences follow.  Those  who  saw  this  sight  are 
fixed  in  the  belief  that  Mr.  Greeley  was  not 
then,  nor  afterward,  aware  that  on  that  evening 
he  partook  of  sustenance." 

It  was  on  this  benevolent  hypothesis  of  ab- 
sent-mindedness that  Mr.  Barnum  apologizes 
for  his  friend's  conduct  on  introducing  him  to 
his  daughter,  who  had  sought  the  honor  with 
much  eagerness.  "  He  looked  at  her,  passed 
his  eyes  down  as  far  as  her  feet  and  up  again 
to  her  face,  but  made  no  motion  of  recogni- 
tion. Caroline  (most  naturally)  felt  mortified, 
and  said  afterward,  '  Well,  father,  that  was  the 
most  curious  introduction  I  ever  had  to  any 
person.  What  was  the  man  thinking  about  ?  '  " 
This  incident  alike  illustrates,  and,  in  some 
measure,  accounts  for  his  manners.  Who  that 
ever  saw  him  cannot  imagine  that  benevolent 
stare,  not  overlooking  the  pleasing  fact  of  his 
friend's  daughter,  but  overlooking  his  own  call 
to  express  his  interest  in  the  conventional  way  ? 

Mr.  Greeley's  "  table  manners"  were  pecul- 
iarly infelicitous.  His  first  appearance  in  this 
role  is  described  by  a  gentleman,  afterward  dis- 
tinguished, who  happened  to  see  him  at  dinner 


PERSONAL   CHARACTERISTICS.  355 

at  the  Poultney  hotel,  "  a  tall,  pale,  white- 
haired,  gawky  lad,  in  his  shirt-sleeves,"  and 
"  eating  with  a  rapidity  and  awkwardness  that 
I  never  saw  equalled  before  or  since.  It 
seemed  as  if  he  were  eating  for  a  wager,  and 
had  gone  in  to  win.  He  neither  looked  up 
nor  around,  nor  appeared  to  pay  the  least  at- 
tention to  the  conversation."  This  wonderful 
performance  actually  occupied  our  informant  so 
that  he  ate  little  himself,  marvelling  such  a  fel- 
low should  be  admitted  to  that  company,  which 
comprised  several  of  the  notabilities  of  the  re- 
gion. What  was  his  increased  amazement 
when  one  of  these  worthies  (the  sheriff)  re- 
ferred a  matter  in  dispute,  relating  to  the  vote 
in  an  early  Congress  on  some  measure,  to  "  the 
unaccountable  boy, "  saying,  "  Ain't  that  right, 
Greeley?"  "No,"  was  the  reply,  without 
looking  up,  "  you're  wrong."  '*  There,"  said 
his  opponent  (an  ex-member  of  Congress),  "  I 
told  you  so."  "And  you're  wrong,  too," 
said  the  "  still-devouring  Mystery."  "  Then," 
goes  on  the  gentleman  to  say,  "  he  laid  down 
his  knife  and  fork,  and  gave  the  history  of  the 
measure,  explained  the  state  of  parties  at  the 
time,  stated  the  vote  in  dispute,  named  the 
leading  advocates  and  opponents  of  the  bill, 
and,  in  short,  gave  a  complete  exposition  of 
the  whole  matter," — all  of  which  was  received  as 
a  political  gospel  or  a  reference  to  the  dictionary. 


356  HORACE   GREELEY. 

It  must  not  be  inferred  that  Mr.  Greeley  was 
a  gourmand^  however  greedy  an  appearance  he 
might  present.  Abstraction  of  mind  was  quite 
as  likely  to  rob  him  of  his  meal  as  to  cause  ex- 
cess. It  was  quite  common  for  him,  in  the 
busy  days  of  his  life  as  a  boss-printer,  if  not 
later,  to  look  up  from  his  work  and  ask  whether 
he  had  been  to  dinner,  to  which  he  got  such 
reply  as  the  spirit  of  mischievous  journeymen 
saw  fit  to  give,  and  acted  accordingly.  The 
table  did  not  always  draw  forth  the  genial  cur- 
rents of  his  soul,  or  unstop  the  iced  decanters 
of  his  conversation.  A  clerical  friend  of  mine 
is  wont  to  give  his  sole  contribution  to  Horace 
Greeley's  table-talk,  when  on  some  social  occa- 
sion he  was  "all  ears,"  with  youthful  venera- 
tion and  enthusiasm,  to  catch  the  words  of  wit 
and  wisdom.  The  only  remark,  of  the  meagre 
feast  of  reason  and  flow  of  soul,  which  has  left 
any  impression  on  his  memory  was,  "  That's 
good  corn  !"  or  words  to  that  effect. 

Not  that  he  could  not  be  delightful  and  racy  in 
conversation,  as  well  as  brilliant  and  singularly 
instructive.  As  a  friend  has  said,  he  could  talk 
away  the  impression  of  his  clothes,  his  uncon- 
ventionality,  and  even  of  his  rudeness,  in  a  short 
time.  For  his  was  a  more  than  negative  sin 
against  the  social  proprieties.  We  need  not  re- 
cur to  examples  already  given  of  his  brusqiierie 
and  bluntnessof  speech,  which  was  often  insult, 


PERSONAL  CHARACTERISTICS.  357 

and  was  only  tolerated  by  those  who  took  him 
as  he  was,  and  believed  in  the  benevolence  of 
heart  which  lay  back  of  che  ungracious  or  rude 
demeanor.  Bores  found  no  quarter  at  his 
hands,  and  your  commonplace  remarks  were 
very  apt  to  receive  anything  but  conventional 
replies.  When  enraged  his  \^ituperation  was 
unrestrained,  though  the  cooler  language  of 
his  pen  was  at  times  fully  equal  to  it. 

We  need  not  make  heavy  draughts  upon  our 
charity  to  account  for,  if  not  excuse,  all  this. 
It  came  from  the  very  same  cause  which  led 
him,  at  the  committee  meetings  on  the  World's 
Fair  (as  related  by  one  of  the  directors),  al- 
though always  the  first  on  the  ground,  invari- 
ably to  fall  asleep.  He  was  a  frightfully  over- 
wrought man,  and  his  nerves  were  in  a  state  of 
perpetual  strain.  So  long  as  he  could  drop 
asleep  at  any  moment,  his  vigorous  frame  en- 
dured. But  when  the  habit  of  abstraction 
caused  by  continuous  brooding  and  worriment 
on  the  subject  of  the  hour  had  produced  its 
fruits  of  irritability  and  pessimistic  alarms,  the 
awful  brain-consumption  of  insomnia  soon 
brought  down  the  shattered  house  of  life  to  its 
untimely  ruins. 

A  few  other  of  Horace  Greeley's  habits  may 
be  adverted  to,  in  an  honest  attempt  to  por- 
tray the  man.     In  his  very  boyhood   he  illus- 


358  HORACE    GREELEY. 

trated  his  New  England  origin,  as  well  as  fore- 
shadowed his  personal  future,  by  his  incessant 
occupation  and  his  tendency  to  make  little 
earnings  for  himself  by  small  savings  and  much 
work.  It  was  from  no  love  for  money  in  itself, 
but  for  what  it  could  buy,  most  of  it  going  for 
books.  Nor  had  he  the  "  Yankee"  love  or 
aptitude  for  trade.  All  through  life  his  dollars 
were  squarely  earned  by  labor,  and  those  lost 
were  by  *  *  trade. ' '  At  the  same  time,  he  never 
worked  with  reference  to  pecuniary  returns. 
His  salary  could  only  be  increased  against  his 
consent,  and  as  a  Tribune  stockholder  he  in- 
variably voted  against  declaring  dividends,  pre- 
ferring to  have  all  earnings  go  to  the  improve- 
ment of  the  paper.  He  would  say  in  reference 
to  outside  opportunities,  as  Professor  Agassiz 
did,  "  I  have  no  time  to  make  money,  and  I 
don't  want  any,  anyhow  ;  money  is  more 
trouble  than  it's  worth." 

Rigidly  economical  himself,  and  always  with 
money  in  hand,  and  having  a  horror  of  debt, 
and  abounding  in  advice  to  young  men  to  pur- 
sue strict  business  habits,  he  was  the  prince  of 
money-lenders  in  the  Scripture  sense  of  lend- 
ing and  hoping  for  nothing  again  (Luke  6  :  35). 
It  was  as  much  a  foible  of  his  as  were  his 
clothes.  In  his  most  straitened  apprentice 
days,  an  old  memorandum-book  of  one  of  his 
companions  contains  numerous  entries  of  un- 


PERSONAL   CHARACTERISTICS.  359 

cancelled  "  borrowings**  of  and  "  owlngs"  to 
"  Horace  Greeley"  for  small  sums.  He  ad- 
vanced to  a  dissipated  young  man,  through  a 
term  of  years,  something  like  $15,000  in  small 
**  loans,"  knowing  that  his  father  would  never 
repay  th^  money.  During  the  first  twenty 
years  of  his  editorship  of  the  Tribune,  he  is 
estimated  by  one  of  his  most  intimate  friends 
to  have  **  advanced  some  $50,000  to  the  mis- 
cellaneous public  on  the  worthless  pledge  of  its 
word."  He  tried  to  hide  the  extent  of  his 
weakness  by  saying  :  "I  don*t  give  much — and 
then  it  is  the  cheapest  way  to  get  rid  of  loaf- 
ers."  He  seemed  to  have  no  will-power  to 
say  "No,"  though  perfectly  clear-sighted  to 
the  hollow  appeals  to  his  pity,  and  the  fraudu- 
lent pretence  of  asking  a  loan.  He  did  not 
hesitate  to  say  as  much  to  the  applicant,  but 
the  money  went  all  the  same.  His  **  loans" 
to  the  "  loafers"  did  not  even  have  the  effect 
of  saving  him  another  visit  on  a  similar  errand. 
These  statements  are  borne  out  by  his  own 
confessions,  which  led  him  to  draw  such  con- 
clusions as  these  :  "  Nine  tenths  of  those  who 
solicit  loans  of  strangers  or  casual  acquaint- 
ances are  thriftless  vagabonds,  who  will  never 
be  better  off  than  at  present,  or  scoundrels  who 
would  never  pay  if  they  were  able."  He  could 
not  recall  a  single  instance  in  which  the  prom- 
ise to  repay  was  fulfilled, — yes,  he  could  name 


360  HORACE   CREELEY. 

one,  but  on  closer  inspection  of  the  note  en- 
closing five  dollars,  he  found  that  the  writer  was 
a  patient  in  tJie  hinatic  asylum  I  He  relates  the 
now  famous  story  about  Edgar  A.  Poe's  note, 
which  he  indorsed  in  order  to  enable  that  wor- 
thy to  buy  the  Broadway  Journal  in  October, 
1845,  ^^^  which,  of  course,  was  collected  of 
the  indorser.  An  enthusiastic  autograph-col- 
lector wrote  to  him  : 

"  Dear  sir,  among  your  literary  treasures  you 
have  doubtless  preserved  several  autographs  of 
our  country's  late  lamented  poet,  Edgar  A. 
Poe.  If  so,  and  you  can  spare  one,  please 
enclose  it  to  me,  and  receive  the  thanks  of 
yours  truly,'* 

To  which  Mr.  Greeley  promptly  replied  : 

**  Dear  sir,  among  my  literary  treasures 
there  happens  to  be  exactly  one  autograph  of 
our  country's  late  lamented  poet,  Edgar  A. 
Poe.  It  is  his  note  of  hand  for  $50,  with  my 
indorsement  across  the  back.  It  cost  me  ex- 
actly $50.75  (including  protest),  and  you  may 
have  it  for  half  that  amount." 

It  need  hardly  be  said  that  the  autograph 
remained  upon  his  hands. 

Now  place  all  this  practice  side  by  side  with 
such  radical  doctrine  as  this  :  "  I  judge  that  at 
least  nine  of  every  ten  loans  to  the  needy  re- 
sult in  loss  to  the  lender,  with  no  substantial 
benefit  to  the  borrower.     .     .     .     He  (the  lat- 


PERSONAL   CHARACTERISTICS.  361 

ter)  thinks  his  first  want  is  a  loan,  but  that  is  a 
great  mistake.  He  is  far  more  certain  to  set 
resolutely  to  work  without,  than  with,  that 
pleasant  but  baleful  accommodation.  Make  up 
a  square  issue, — Work  or  starve  !  The  widow, 
the  orphan,  the  cripple,  the  invalid,  often  need 
alms  and  should  have  them  ;  but  to  the  innu- 
merable hosts  of  needy,  would-be  borrowers  the 
best  response  is  nature's, — *  Root,  hog,  or  die !'  " 

Of  course  all  this  unwise  lavishness,  for  which 
he  received  full  (dis)credit,  must  have  been 
much  less  than  the  unknown  benefactions  to 
hundreds  of  worthy  objects  of  which  inquisitive 
gossip  took  no  note,  and  whose  credit  is  on  the 
books  of  heaven,  which  alone  can  disclose  the 
quiet  stream  of  tender  mercies  which  attended 
his  footsteps,  and  which  left  him  a  poor  man 
where  others  would  have  died  millionaires. 

One  of  his  first  employers  in  New  York  testi- 
fies that  he  accomplished  by  sheer  industry 
more  than  any  other  compositor  in  his  office, 
and  often  more  than  double  for  the  week,  and 
yet  he  would  talk  all  the  time,  exemplifying  the 
parallel  activity  of  both  mind  and  body,  like 
the  two  pistons  of  a  walking-beam.  He  had 
his  own  habits  of  work.  His  extraordinary 
penmanship  we  have  already  spoken  of. 
"  Good  God  !"  said  a  new  compositor,  to 
whom  a  "  take"  of  the  editor's  copy  had  been 
handed,  "  If  Belshazzar  had  seen  this  writing 


362  HORACE   GREELEY. 

on  the  wall,  he  would  have  been  more  terrified 
than  he  was."  When  staying  at  Mr.  Bar- 
num's,  that  gentleman  says  that  he  could  never 
write  except  by  raising  the  desk  as  high  as  his 
head,  so  that  he  had  a  desk  of  that  kind  ar- 
ranged in  the  library  expressly  for  his  visitor's 
use.  This  habit  must  have  arisen  from  his  old 
posture  at  a  compositor's  case,  where  he  did 
his  first  writing  for  the  papers.  We  have, 
however,  seen  him  writing  with  entire  facility 
at  an  ordinary  table. 

His  idea  of  recreation  was  peculiar.  His 
experiences  of  steamboat  excursions  was  that 
they  were  bores,  and  he  never  even  attempted 
a  railroad  excursion  which  was  to  outlast  the 
day.  He  was  a  great  walker,  especially  in  his 
youth,  when  he  walked  nearly  six  hundred 
miles  to  visit  his  parents.  In  boyhood  he  was 
an  enthusiastic  and  persevering  fisherman  and 
bee-hunter  ;  but  in  later  life  he  had  no  oppor- 
tunities for  the  latter  occupation,  and  the 
former  lost  its  fascination.  *'  I  had  become," 
he  says,  "  in  my  poor  way,  a  fisher  of  men." 
Naturally  enough  he  confesses  himself  never 
to  have  been  an  expert  ball-player,  and  that 
"  it  was  quite  beyond  my  powers  of  acquisi- 
tion ...  to  catch  a  flying  ball,  propelled 
by  a  muscular  arm  straight  at  my  nose,  and 
coming  on  so  swiftly  that  I  could  scarcely  see 
it."     He  was  fond  of  checkers  and  cards,  but 


PERSONAL   CHARACTERISTICS.  363 

advises  persons  of  indoor  life  and  sedentary- 
pursuits  to  prefer  bowling  and  billiards.  He 
often  "  cooled  his  imagination,  amid  the  swel- 
tering heats  of  a  summer  of  constant  work  in 
the  city,  with  a  dream  of  spending  a  week 
amid  the  lakes  and  mountains  under  the  dense 
forest  shades  of  '  John  Brown's  Tract,'  "  as  the 
Adirondack  wilderness  was  then  called,  but  he 
never  appears  to  have  seen  his  Carcassonne. 
"  During  my  thirty-six  years  of  sojourn  in 
New  York,"  he  could  say,  pathetically,  in  1868, 
"  I  have  seen  few  holidays."  But  he  had  an 
almost  Johnsonian  attachment  to  city  life,  with 
all  his  sentiment  concerning  the  country,  and 
his  illusion  of  his  special  fitness  for  a  farmer's 
life.  He  had  at  least  the  faculty  of  enjoying 
city  haunts  and  habits,  such  as  his  quiet  dinner 
with  a  friend  at  Windust's,  his  evenings  and 
spontaneous  levees  at  che  Union  League  Club 
(where  also  he  had  a  room  to  occupy  on  the 
nights  in  which  he  might  be  detained  in  town). 
In  fact,  he  seems  to  have  been  half-conscious 
of  this  himself,  for  he  presumes  that  if  he  were 
ever  to  have  the  week  in  "  John  Brown's 
Tract"  which  he  coveted,  he  "  should  find  it 
insufferably  tedi-ous,  the  mosquitoes  biting 
superbly,  and  the  trout  shyly  or  not  at  all,  and 
should  long  for  a  return  to  civilization,  with  its 
hourly  toils  and  struggles,  its  thronged  pave- 
ments, and  its  damp  newspapers  with  breakfast." 


364  HORACE    GREELEY. 

He  had  a  natural  taste  for  the  drama,  and 
in  early  childhood  would  enact  original  plays 
for  their  own  amusement.  When  he  came  to 
New  York  he  went  to  see  the  best  plays  and 
acting  of  the'  day,  especially  at  the  Richmond 
Hill  Theatre  (on  the  site  of  Aaron  Burr's  old 
country-seat)  ;  in  Europe  he  saw  Dickens  in 
private  theatricals.  But  in  later  years  he  sel- 
dom or  never  went,  believing  the  theatre  to 
be  on  the  wrong  side  of  moral  reform,  of  bad 
influence  as  a  whole,  though  capable  of  re- 
generation. His  advice  to  a  young  man  was, 
to  "  Go  once  to  a  good  theatre,  and  never 
darken  the  door  of  any  playhouse  again." 

We  have  spoken  of  his  vegetarian  habits,  his 
lifelong  total  abstinence  from  a  boy  of  thir- 
teen, his  abjuring  of  coffee  because  he  found 
his  hand  trembling  on  awaking  after  taking  a 
strong  cup  of  it  on  the  evening  previous. 
Having,  with  some  small  companions,  surrepti- 
tiously smoked  a  half-consumed  cigar  at  five 
years  old,  wherefrom  he  "  was  soon  the  sickest 
mortal  on  the  face  of  this  planet,"  he  could 
say,  "  That  half-inch  of  cigar-stump  will  last 
me  all  my  life,  though  its  years  should  out- 
number Methuselah's."  And,  furthermore  : 
"  From  that  hour  to  this  the  chewing,  smok- 
ing, or  snuffing  of  tobacco  has  seemed  to  me, 
if  not  the  most  pernicious,  certainly  the  vilest 
and  most   detestable  abuse    of   his   corrupted 


PERSONAL   CHARACTERISTICS.  365 

sensual    appetites    whereof    depraved    man    is 
capable." 

Mr.  Greeley  was  noteworthy  for  his  observ- 
ance of  the  Sabbath.  His  rule  was  the  old 
New  England  one  of  closing  down  at  sunset 
(or  six  o'clock)  on  Saturday  and  resuming  at 
sunrise  on  Monday,  thus  securing  a  full  day  of 
twenty-four  hours  for  rest.  It  would  have 
been  far  better  if  the  paper  "  founded  by  Hor- 
ace Greeley"  had  continued  to  build  upon  this 
foundation  of  honor  to  God  and  rest  for  men. 
He  was  a  faithful  churchgoer.  It  will  be  re- 
membered that  on  his  first  and  forlorn  Sunday 
in  New  York,  from  his  lodging  over  McGor- 
lick's  dram-shop  he  set  forth  as  a  matter  of 
course  to  a  place  of  public  worship.  His  mem- 
bership was  first  in  the  Orchard  Street  Univer- 
salist  Church  of  New  York,  till  Dr.  Sawyer's 
removal,  when  he  connected  himself  with  Dr. 
Chapin's.  He  was  not  a  communicant,  how- 
ever, from  conscientious  scruples  as  to  the  use 
of  intoxicating  wine  used  at  the  sacrament. 
His  adoption  of  Restorationist  views  of  escha- 
tology  was  the  product  solely  of  his  own  reason- 
ing while  still  a  boy  in  his  father's  house.  Up 
to  thfs  time  he  had  never  seen  one  who  was 
called,  or  who  called  himself,  a  Universalist, 
and  neither  saw  nor  read  a  page  of  any  one's 
writings  for  years  thereafter  ;  he  had  only 
heard  "  that  there  were  a  few  graceless  repriD- 


366  HORACE   GREELEY. 

bates  and  scurvy  outcasts,  who  pretended  to 
believe  that  all  men  would  be  saved,  and  to 
wrench  the  Scriptures  into  some  sort  of  con- 
formity to  their  mockery  of  a  creed."  He  was 
not  merely  a  theoretical,  but  a  sectarian  Uni- 
versalist,  loyal  to  his  church  and  minister,  and 
thoroughly  identified  with  its  welfare  and  its 
work.  So  prominent  was  he  in  the  church, 
that  on  a  crowded  night  Dr.  Chapin  would 
have  him  up  beside  him  in  the  pulpit  ;  and  on 
a  Christmas  day  when  the  pastor  was  ill,  Mr. 
Greeley  was  by  general  request  made  the 
preacher  of  the  occasion. 

He  tells  a  characteristic  story  of  an  utter 
stranger,  living  two  hundred  miles  away,  who 
actually  had  the  "  cheek"  to  write  a  letter 
asking  Mr.  Greeley  to  lend  him  a  large  sum  on 
a  mortgage  of  his  farm,  and  closing  with  the 
postscript  :  "  My  religious  views  are  radically 
antagonistic  to  yours  ;  but  I  know  no  member 
of  my  own  church  of  whom  I  would  so  readily 
and  with  such  confidence  ask  such  a  favor  as 
of  you."  To  which  he  replied  :  "  Sir,  I  have 
neither  the  money  you  ask  for,  nor  the  inclina- 
tion to  lend  it  on  the  security  you  proffer. 
And  your  P.  S.  prompts  the  suggestion  that 
whenever  /  shall  be  moved  to  seek  favors  of 
the  members  of  some  other  church,  rather  than 
of  that  to  which  I  have  hitherto  adhered,  I 
shall  make  haste  to  join  that  other  church."   • 


CHAPTER  XXII. 

RESUME   AND    ESTIMATE. 

We  have  now  come  to  the  most  difficult 
part  of  our  undertaking, — to  formulate  an  in- 
telligible and  honest  estimate  of  Horace  Greeley 
and  of  his  career.  The  materials  for  such  a 
judgment  are  abundant  enough,  but  they  are 
as  diverse  and  heterogeneous  as  they  are  nu- 
merous. Yet,  we  may  say  in  advance,  that  no 
intelligible  idea  of  this  complex  character  and 
life  can  be  formed,  which  does  not  find  its  clew 
in  his  very  "  inconsistencies," — the  only  re- 
spect in  which  he  was  consistent.  What  he 
might  have  been,  if  born  and  bred  amid  influ- 
ences of  more  culture  and  discipline,  we  will 
not  attempt  to  conjecture.  We  must  take 
him  as  he  was, — a  child  of  nature,  self-taught, 
and  knowing  no  education  for  life  except  in  the 
University  of  Experience  and  the  Gymnasium 
of  Hard  Knocks.  All  men  must  be  tried  by 
the  same  unyielding  rules  of  truth  and  of  duty  ; 
but,  before  the  final  judgment  of  the  court  is 
rendered  up,  every  man  has  a  right  to  be  re- 
garded  from   a  view-point  somewhat  parallel 


368  HORACE   GREELEY. 

with  his  own.  We  have  endeavored  so  to  make 
up  the  record  that  the  facts  shall  be  their  own 
best  interpreter,  or  at  least  enable  the  reader 
to  rectify  our  misjudgments.  What  kind  of  a 
man  have  we  found  this  Horace  Greeley  to  be  ? 
Intellectually,  he  was  remarkable  for  tech- 
nical memory,  for  mental  activity,  and  for 
clear,  racy,  and  forcible  expression.  His  mind 
was  stimulated  to  the  neglect  of  the  outer 
man's  culture.  He  was  as  evidently  marked 
by  the  stamp  of  the  printing-press  from  his 
birth,  as  Plato  is  said  to  have  drawn  the  Hybla 
bees  to  his  budding  lips,  though,  as  is  frequent- 
ly the  case  with  men  of  special  genius,  he 
imagined  that  his  mission  was  to  those  agricul- 
tural pursuits  from  which  he  had  been  drawn 
away  to  the  types,  like  a  magnetized  needle  to 
iron  filings.  This  is  only  an  instance  of  the 
visionary  and  sentimental  cast  of  his  thought 
and  theories,  as  contrasted  with  the  practical 
and  utilitarian  tendency  of  his  action.  His 
was  the  unusual  combination  of  a  speculative 
mind  and  a  realistic  method.  His  opinions 
were  formed  amid  a  cloud-capped  region  of 
rarefied  thought  and  lofty  principle  ;  his  pres- 
entation of  details  was  prosaic,  plausible,  and 
at  least  seemingly  practical.  He  was  great  in 
"the  economics  of  life,"  after  the  manner  of 
that  greater  and  more  practical  printer,  Benja- 
min   Franklin.       He    was   the    "  white-coated 


RESUME   AND   ESTIMATE.  369 

philosopher,"  wliose  philosophy  was  as  far 
apart  from  ordinary  men's  as  were  his  clothes, 
and  he  was  at  the  same  time  the  shirt-sleeved 
toiler  among  every-day  men  at  every-day  work. 
Like  most  self-made  men  his  intellect  was  dis- 
tinguished for  strength  rather  than  delicacy, 
either  of  perception  or  application.  It  was 
the  roller  printing-press  rather  than  the  en- 
graver's tool.  And  yet  he  had  a  keen  wit 
and  a  Joab-like  sense  of  where  the  fifth  rib  of 
his  Abners  lay.  By  a  word  of  homely  sense 
he  would  often  pierce  through  the  most  labored 
or  learned  argument.  But,  as  some  one  has 
said,  **  He  strove  to  look  into  every  object  for 
examination,  but  not  to  look  around  it."  His 
mind,  swayed  by  his  principles,  was  apt  to  form 
precipitate  conclusions  ;  and  having  so  done, 
he  always  knew  that  he  was  right,  and  all  the 
world  that  differed  from  him  was  a  blockhead. 
In  forming  opinions  he  was  independent  of  all 
authority  except  his  own  common-sense  ;  and 
in  defending  or  enforcing  them,  he  could  make 
scant  allowance  for  those  who  saw  things  other- 
wise, and  had  little  patience  with  fine  doubts  or 
discriminations.  In  controversy,  which  was 
his  perpetual  panoply,  his  favorite  weapon  was 
the  mace  rather  than  the  javelin. 

He  was  singularly  free  from  the  power  of 
tradition  and  prescription,  from  the  authority 
of  words,   or  the  spell  of  name  or   position. 


370  HORACE   GREELEY. 

No  mere  learning,  as  such,  had  value  in  his 
eyes,  especially  if  he  had  not  found  use  for  it 
in  his  self-education.  He  was  a  devourer  of 
books,  but  almost  never  quoted  fro^m  them. 
He  felt  that  he  had  learned  most  from  the 
library  of  human  life  and  action.  In  this 
direction  his  mind  was  open  and  just,  perhaps 
more  than  if  it  had  had  more  veneration  for 
the  past  and  the  accredited.  And  yet  it  is  a 
mistake  to  regard  him  as  an  extremist.  What 
was  mistaken  as  a  passion  for  innovation  was 
more  properly  a  passion  for  improvement, 
growing  out  of  his  keen  sense  of  earthly  imper- 
fection and  human  injustice  and  inequality. 
The  practical  trend  of  his  mind  made  him  a 
disappointing  reformer  and  an  unmanageable 
politician.  He  was  always  in  the  minority  and 
in  disfavor  within  his  own  party,  because  he 
was  not  prepared  either  to  blindly  follow  the 
leader,  or  trim  his  sail  to  the  impulse  of  the 
hour, — nor,  on  the  other  hand,  to  wait  the  slow 
rising  of  the  tides  of  truth  and  righteousness. 
He  was,  in  fact,  from  the  time  of  his  starting 
the  Tribime  an  independent  in  politics.  He 
owed  no  man  anything  for  the  founding  of  that 
paper,  and  the  Whigs  and  Republicans  were 
deeply  in  his  debt  from  first  to  last.  It  is  an 
entire  mistake  and  impertinence  to  accuse  him 
of  breach  of  party  obligation.  Even  his  de- 
sertion at  critical  hours  in  the  Disunion  epoch 


RESUME   AND    ESTIMATE.  37 1 

must  "be  judged  purely  from  the  standpoint  of 
his  personal  convictions. 

The  best  clew  to  the  enigma  of  Horace 
Greeley's  numerous  antagonisms  of  character 
and  inconsistencies  of  conduct  is  probably  that 
furnished  by  the  man  who,  from  analytic  and 
critical  genius,  combined  with  his  intimate  and 
constant  relations  of  a  lifetime,  was  best  quali- 
fied to  judge — George  Ripley.  "  He  was  one 
thing  through  his  intellect,  and  something  else 
through  his  temperament.  He  counselled  con- 
servatism and  expediency  sometimes,  and  was 
himself  radical  and  headstrong.  Principles 
absorbed  him  ;  men  touched  him  hardly  at  all. 
Calm  in  mental  atmospheres,  he  parted  with 
self-restraint  in  personal  associations.  Meas- 
ures impressed  him  ;  politicians  annoyed  him. 
His  want  of  discipline  prompted  him  to  yield 
to  his  moods,  which  were  many  and  contradic- 
tory, and  not  to  be  foreseen  even  by  himself. 
As  may  be  supposed,  his  casual  acquaintance 
judged  him  by  his  manners,  and  the  public 
by  his  mind." 

It  was  a  strange  personality, — this  clear  and 
commanding  intellect  and  strong  elements  of 
manhood  combined  with  a  lack  of  self-disci- 
pline which  amounted  to  childishness.  He 
never  lost  the  simplicity,  the  naturalness,  nor 
even  the  spoiled  petulance  of  a  child.  He 
stood  out  from  the  world  of  men  about  him  as 


3/2  HORACE   GREELEY. 

never  a  man  of  the  world.  He  was  singular, 
for  one  in  his  position  and  with  his  experience, 
in  being  swayed  by  impulse,  and  in  saying  di- 
rectly what  he  thought.  But  though  he  al- 
ways remained  himself  a  child  of  nature,  he 
developed  the  most  intense  and  absorbing  in- 
terest in  the  arts  and  laws  and  relations  of 
civilization.  He  seemed  to  feel,  as  migratory 
birds  feel  the  springs  and  autumns  in  the  air, 
the  atmospheric  currents  of  American  life  and 
destiny  ;  and  his  failure  to  accomplish  greater 
things  was  because  he  was  too  impatient  in 
desire,  and  premature  in  act.  His  mission, 
though  he  would  not  see  it,  was  to  arouse  the 
hunt,  to  start  the  cry,  but  not  to  be  in  at  the 
death.  His  call  was  to  be  a  Voice  in  the 
Wilderness,  an  awakener  of  thought  and  con- 
science. He  belonged  to  the  epoch  of  the  agi- 
tator and  the  pioneer  in  reform  and  politics.  He 
was  a  moulder  of  opinion,  rather  than  of  events. 
His  place  in  history  we  shall  not  undertake 
to  conjecture  ;  but  it  cannot  be  an  obscure  or 
a  transient  one,  for  he  dealt  with  the  principles 
of  our  national  life,  and  with  the  seed-sowing 
of  our  history.  He  identified  himself  with  the 
men  and  events  in  the  great  transition  era  of 
the  Republic.  His  unique  personality  will  not 
soon  fade  out  of  our  national  portrait  gallery. 
He  will  be  remembered  for  his  leading  part  in 
the   progress   of    American   journalism.       He 


RESUME   AND    ESTIMATE.  373 

cannot  be  forgotten,  because  of  his  suggestion 
and  influential  promotion  of  social  reforms 
which,  however  crudely  or  prematurely  he  may 
have  presented  them,  are  already  the  corner- 
stones of  to-day's  conservative  security.  It 
were  curious  to  conjecture  what  the  result 
would  have  been  of  his  election  to  the  Presi- 
dency,— whether  it  would  have  helped  or  hin- 
dered the  object  of  national  reconciliation, 
which  was  his  motive  in  becoming  a  candidate. 
It  seems  most  likely  that  it  would  have  proved 
a  suicidal  act  for  the  party  which  nominated 
him,  and  that  a  new  Greeley  party  would  have 
been  the  outcome,  with  a  new  prestige  and 
new  impulses,  and  forcing  forward  old  issues 
which  long  remained  latent ;  and  thus  the 
whole  political  history  of  our  country  would 
have  been  changed.  But  he  died  when  his 
work  was  done. 

I  think  that,  with  all  his  faults  and  failures, 
he  has  heard  from  the  Judge  of  all,  *'  Well 
done,  good  and  faithful  servant."  Fidelity 
was,  perhaps,  the  most  marked  and  undeviating 
trait  of  his  character.  In  his  boyhood  on  the 
farm  his  brother  would  sometimes  say,  when 
their  father  had  set  them  a  task  and  gone  from 
home,  "  Come,  Hod,  let's  go  fishing. "  "  No," 
was  the  sure  reply  of  that  little  piping  voice, 
**  let  us  do  our  stint  first."  And  so  it  was  to 
the  end. 


374  HORACE    GREELEY, 

He  had  a  passion  for  reality.  He  was  the 
great  democrat  of  his  time,  **  Above  all,"  he 
wrote  to  an  aspiring  country  youth,  "  be 
neither  afraid  nor  ashamed  of  honest  industry  ; 
and  if  you  catch  yourself  fancying  anything 
more  respectable  than  this,  be  ashamed  of  it  to 
the  last  day  of  your  life.  Or  if  you  find  your- 
self shaking  more  cordially  the  hand  of  your 
cousin  the  Congressman  than  of  your  uncle 
the  blacksmith,  as  such,  write  yourself  down 
an  enemy  to  the  principles  of  our  institutions, 
and  a  traitor  to  the  dignity  of  humanity." 
He  believed  in  the  people  as  the  source  of  all 
true  progress  and  the  conservators  of  liberty. 
He  loved  them  with  a  certain  fatherliness  which 
would  not  be  shut  out  from  them  by  inner 
rooms  or  bolted  doors  in  his  busiest  hours. 
His  heart  best  took  them  in  in  masses — States, 
organizations,  and  his  philanthropy  would  save 
them  in  the  lump. 

His  non-combatancy  was  inborn  ;  no  annoy- 
ances, or  even  outrages,  from  his  school-fellows 
and  fellow-apprentices  could  draw  from  him 
anything  more  than  a  good-humored,  "  Now, 
boys,  don't  !"  He  seemed  incapable  of  in- 
flicting pain  ;  when  set  at  school,  according  to 
some  barbarous  rule,  to  work  out  his  own  pun- 
ishment by  acting  as  the  flagellant  of  another 
boy,  who  doubtless  richly  deserved  a  flogging, 
all  the  efforts  of  the  teacher  could  not  stimu- 


RESUME   AND    ESTIMATE.  375 

late  him  to  making  it  anything  more  than  a 
farce,  and  an  innocuous  going  through  the 
forms.  This,  too,  was  a  parable  which  ex- 
plains much  of  his  after  doings  in  the  great 
world-school.  He  so  shrank  from  the  thought 
that  any  one  should  be  hurt,  that  he  could  not 
endure  the  spectre  of  the  gallows  for  the  most 
cruel  murderer,  nor  the  possibility  of  eternal 
penalty  for  the  most  hopeless  reprobate  ;  and 
after  setting  the  bloody  engine  of  war  at  work, 
he  almost  severed  his  own  head  and  broke  his 
own  right  arm  by  an  almost  instantaneous  in- 
terposition to  stop  it. 

His  private  life  was  pure  and  sweet  and  irre- 
proachable. We  know  of  none  of  his  great 
contemporaries  of  the  press  who  gives  us  such 
an  impression  of  moral  elevation  and  indepen- 
dence, of  as  utter  disinterestedness  and  gener- 
ous self-devotion,  of  "  simplicity  and  godly 
sincerity."  Of  his  place  in  the  kingdom  of 
heaven,  we  who  differ  from  him  in  religious 
tenets,  and  disapprove  of  certain  things  in  him 
unbecoming  the  Christian  profession,  will  ven- 
ture the  judgment  that  when  the  rough  and 
prickly  shell  of  earthhood  is  sloughed  off,  there 
remains  one  of  our  country's  most  "  pure  in 
heart,"  "merciful,"  and  "peacemaking"  (if 
not  always  as  "  meek"  and  "  poor  in  spirit" 
as  he  would  have  been  more  "  blessed"  to  have 
been),  but  always  manlike  as  he  was  childlike. 


37^  HORACE   GREELEY. 

*'  The  elements 
So  mixed  in  him,  that  nature  might  stand  up 
And  say  to  all  the  world.  This  was  a  man  !" 

We  have  already  said,  however,  that  the 
only  consistent  clew  to  Horace  Greeley's  char- 
acter is  in  the  recognition  of  his  inconsisten- 
cies, in  the  duality  and  consequent  antagonism 
of  his  nature,  more  particularly  of  his  heart 
and  of  his  head.  In  taking  the  size  and  meas- 
ure of  this  man,  we  find  strong  points  and  good 
qualities  enough  for  the  fitting  out  of  half  a 
dozen  statesmen  and  able  editors  ;  and  we  also 
find  faults  and  weaknesses  enough  to  largely 
countervail  his  virtues  and  limit  his  success, 
and  to  give  to  his  dramatic  career  too  much 
the  aspect  of  a  tragi-comedy  ;  to  make  him,  in 
a  sense,  an  Esau  among  men,  and  in  another 
sense  a  leader  and  commander  of  the  people, 
the  best  hated  and  the  best  loved  man  of  his 
time,  the  educator  of  a  nation, — and  yet  un- 
recognized and  repudiated.  No  man  was  ever 
more  independent  of  the  mere  vox popiili,  and 
yet  none  thirsted  more  for  appreciation,  ask- 
ing recognition,  though  not  reward  of  men  ; 
keenly  sensitive  of  personal  treatment,  and 
perhaps  too  much  influenced  by  it  as  regarded 
persons,  but  never  as  regarded  principles  or 
public  conduct,  he  had  the  stuff  of  martyrs, 
and  was  conscious  of  a  martyr's  pains,  though 
not  claiming  a  martyr's  crown. 


RESUME   ANp   ESTIMATE.  377 

He  was  equally  an  egoist  and  an  altruist ;  he 
was  a  despotic  assertor  of  universal  liberty  ;  he 
was  the  imperious  Tribune  of  the  people  ;  he 
was  a  compulsory  philanthropist.  His  philoso- 
phy was  peace,  but  his  enforcement  of  it  was 
war  ;  its  teaching  was  democracy,  but  its  prac- 
tice was  autocracy  ;  he  was  belligerent  when 
men  cried  peace,  but  a  pacificator  when  their 
voice  was  still  for  war.  He  was  a  modern 
knight-errant  in  his  championship  of  the  weak 
and  oppressed,  and  in  all  true  chivalry  of  soul, 
and  yet  a  Don  Quixote  in  person,  and  in  his 
ofttimes  incapacity  to  distinguish  windmills 
from  giants.  He  was  the  strangest  mixture 
of  womanly  gentleness  and  an  almost  savage 
ferocity.  One  of  his  best  friends  speaks  of  his 
"  social  savagery."  Like  many  a  great  actor 
on  the  mimic  stage,  he  thought  he  was  just 
what  he  was  not — a  diplomatist,  an  executive, 
a  practical  legislator,  instead  of  a  prophet,  a 
critic,  and  a  public  censor. 

He  was  the  editor  everywhere,  always  emit- 
ting editorials,  informing,  directing,  impelling, 
oracular.  There  was  no  such  word  as  sub- 
ordination  in  his  dictionary  after  he  had  won 
his  spurs.  He  must  be  "  aiit  Ccssar,  aut  mil- 
lus^  He  was  so  profound  an  emancipation- 
ist, with  (if  you  please)  so  morbid  a  desire  to 
have  all  men  enjoy  the  utmost  possible  liberty, 
and  to  have  all  restrictions  removed,  as  far  as 


378  HORACE    GREELEY. 

practicable,  that  he,  perhaps  prematurely,  ap- 
plied it  to  the  slave-holders  as  he  had  asserted 
it  for  the  slaves. 

But  amid  all  the  seeming  confusion  and  para- 
dox   of  Horace  Greeley's  character  and  career, 
his  course  was  always  guided   by  certain  fixed 
stars  of  Truth  and   Duty,  Righteousness  and 
Mercy.      His  reckonings  may  not  have  been  al- 
ways correctly  taken,  but  in  his  most  devious 
ways  his  aim  was  always  "  God's,  his  Country's, 
and  Mankind's."     He  was  as  honest  as  "  Old 
Abe,"  as  fearless  as  John  Adams,  as  wise  for 
other  men  as  Franklin,  as  unselfishly  patriotic 
as  the  Father  of  his  Country  ;  he  was  a  Luther 
whose  words  were  half  battles,  and  a  Melanch- 
thon  whose  word  was  all  for  peace  with  purity 
and  truth.      He  was  rude  of  speech  like  Brutus, 
but  he  reserved  the  sharpest  dagger  for  him- 
self whenever  it  pleased  his  country  to  need 
the  death  of  his  good  name.      And,  after  all, 
his  bark  was  always  worse  than  his  bite.      He 
was,  as  we  have  said,  the  Boythorne  of  Ameri- 
can  politics   and  journalism.      Behind    all   his 
impetuous  exaggeration  of  speech  and  epithet, 
there  was  a  heart    as   tender,    merciful,    and 
pacific  as  the  Quaker  poet's. 

We  think  it  is  fast  becoming  the  consensus  of 
all  candid  and  discriminating  minds  that  Hor- 
ace Greeley,  however  mistaken   or  impractical, 


RESUME   AND    ESTIMATE.  379 

was  from  first  to  last  "  a  man  of  earnest  prin- 
ciple, of  broad  humanity,  and  inflexible  princi- 
ple," whose  sincerity  and  integrity  are  not  to 
be  questioned.  Here  is  the  testimony  of  one 
who,  more  and  longer  than  any  one  else,  had 
the  opportunity  to  know  him  at  his  best  and 
at  his  worst,  as  a  friend  and  as  a  foe.  Mr. 
Charles  A.  Dana  said,  some  years  ago  :  "  Those 
who  have  examined  the  history  of  this  remark- 
able man,  and  who  know  how  to  estimate  the 
friendlessness,  the  disabilities,  and  the  disadvan- 
tages which  surrounded  his  childhood  and 
youth  ;  the  scanty  opportunities,  rather  the 
absence  of  all  opportunity  of  education  ;  the 
destitution  and  loneliness  amid  which  he 
struggled  for  the  possession  of  knowledge, 
and  the  unflinching  zeal  and  pertinacity  with 
which  he  provided  for  himself  the  materials  for 
intellectual  growth,  will  heartily  echo  the  popu- 
lar judgment  that  he  was  indeed  a  man  of 
genius,  marked  out  from  his  cradle  to  inspire, 
animate,  and  instruct  others."  And  very  re- 
cently Mr.  Dana  has  thus  spoken  in  the  edi- 
torial columns  of  the  Sun  :  "  What  a  noble 
and  useful  career  it  was  !  Even  the  final  fail- 
ure, and  the  tragic  end  which  disappointment 
brought  upon  him,  contained  nothing  foolish 
or  ignoble.  .  .  .  No  citizen  has  ever  ex- 
ceeded him  in  virtue,  in  fidelity  to  the  prin- 
ciples of  freedom  and  progress,  in  unswerving 


380  HORACE   GREFXEY. 

devotion  to  the  Republic,  or  in  love  for  that 
great  unity  of  humanity  in  which  every  indi- 
vidual is  but  a  fragment,  an  atom,  seen  for  the 
passing  hour,  and  living  and  acting  but  to  dis- 
appear at  last." 

Horace  Greeley's  imperfections  lay  upon  the 
surface  ;  his  follies  were  worn  upon  his  sleeve 
for  daws  to  peck  at.  We  all  have  our  foibles 
and  our  faults,  and  cannot  afford  to  cast  stones 
upon  his  grave, — certainly  not  until  we  can  say 
that  we  have  been  as  sincere  in  motive,  as  pure 
in  heart,  and  as  self-denying  in  life  ;  and  then 
we  shall  not  wish  to  do  it.  Let  us  rather  con- 
tribute the  stones  for  that  seemly  monument 
which  has  so  long  waited.  And  let  it  stand 
beside  Franklin's  in  that  Printing-house 
Square  where  his  heart  and  work  were  centred, 
and  where  he  looked  down  from  the  Tribune 
windows  upon  the  hurrying  throngs  of  the  city 
that  he  loved,  and  the  people  for  whom  he 
lived  and  died.  And  let  his  fond  ambition 
there  find  a  more  conspicuous  realization, 
**  That  the  stone  which  covers  my  ashes  may 
bear  to  future  eyes  the  still  intelligible  inscrip- 
tion, *  Founder  of  the  New  York  Trib- 
une.' " 

My  delicate  and  difficult  task  is  done,  and 
I  submit  it  to  the  judgment  of  men  in  the 
same  spirit  in  which  the  life  itself,  of  which 


RESUME   AND   ESTIMATE.  38 1 

this  is  the  record,  was  lived  in  their  sight. 
Mr.  Greeley  once  wrote  :  **  I  envy  the  biographer 
of  Robert  and  Elizabeth  Barrett  Browning." 
Why  ?  Because  the  elements  had  all  conspired 
to  make  their  married  life  one  unmarred  dream 
of  love,  romance,  and  poetry,  of  perfect  sym- 
pathy and  mutual  helpfulness,  of  worldly  pros- 
pering and  artistic  growth,  crowned  by  sweet 
memories  and  eternal  hopes.  His  own  experi- 
ence was  a  very  different  one  ;  but  it  has  been 
one  of  the  supreme  satisfactions  of  my  life  to 
have  been  assigned  to  be  the  biographer  of 
Horace  Greeley.  I  cannot  regard  his  life  to 
have  been  in  any  sense  a  failure.  As  an  editor, 
surely  not,  when  he  has  left  as  his  real  monu- 
ment a  paper  so  clean,  so  cultured,  and  so  com- 
prehensive as  the  Tribuney — unquestionably  to- 
day, as  in  his  day,  one  of  the  greatest  journal- 
istic powers  in  this  land.  Still  less  a  failure,  if 
we  try  him  by  his  own  noble  ideal  alike  of  the 
editor  and  the  reformer  :  *'  He  who,  by  voice 
or  pen,  strikes  his  best  blow  at  the  impostures 
and  vices  whereby  our  race  is  debased  and 
paralyzed,  may  close  his  eyes  in  death,  consoled 
and  cheered  by  the  reflection  that  he  has  done 
what  he  could  for  the  emancipation  and  eleva- 
tion of  mankind." 

As  a  politician  he  was  surely  not  a  failure, 
when  we  consider  his  share  in  the  grandest 
achievement  of  modern  times, — the  casting  of 


382  HORACE    GREELEY. 

the  devil  out  of  our  own  fair  South,  and  the 
bringing  of  her  back,  clothed  and  in  her  right 
mind,  to  the  feet  of  the  Union,  Here  also  we 
may  use  his  own  words  :  "If  the  designation 
of  politician  is  a  discreditable  one,  I  trust  I 
have  done  nothing  toward  making  it  so.  If  to 
consider  not  only  what  is  desirable,  but  what 
is  possible  as  well  ;  if  to  consider  in  what  order 
desirable  ends  can  be  attained,  and  attempt 
them  in  that  order  ;  if  to  seek  one  good  so  as 
not  to  undo  another, — if  either  or  all  of  these 
constitute  one  a  politician,  I  do  not  shrink 
from  the  appellation."  The  secret  of  his  good 
conscience  at  the  close,  as  of  his  power  during 
the  course  of  his  great  career,  was  simply  that 
alike  of  Psalmist  and  apostle,  "  Having  the 
same  spirit  of  faith,  according  as  it  is  written, 
*/  believed,  tJierefore  have  I  spoken ;'  we  also 
believe,  and  therefore  speak. "  No  man's  life 
can  be  a  failure  who  can  say,  as  he  looks  back 
over  fifty-seven  years  of  it,  such  words  as  these  : 
My  life  has  been  busy  and  anxious,  but 
not  joyless.  Whether  it  shall  be  prolonged 
few  or  more  years,  I  am  grateful  that  it  has 
endured  so  long,  and  that  it  has  abounded  in 
opportunities  for  good  not  wholly  unimproved, 
and  in  experiences  of  the  nobler  as  well  as  the 
baser  impulses  of  human  nature.  I  have  been 
spared  to  see  the  end  of  giant  wrongs,  which 
I  once  deemed  invincible  in  this  century,  and 


RESUME   AND    ESTIMATE.  383 

to  note  the  silent  upsprlnging  and  growth  of 
principles  and  influences  which  I  hail  as  des- 
tined to  root  out  some  of  the  most  flagrant 
and  pervading  influences  that  yet  remain. 
.  .  .  So,  looking  calmly,  yet  humbly,  for 
that  close  of  my  mortal  career  which  cannot  be 
far  distant,  I  reverently  thank  God  for  the 
blessings  vouchsafed  me  in  the  past  ;  and  with 
an  awe  that  is  not  fear,  and  a  consciousness  of 
demerit  which  does  not  exclude  hope,  await 
the  opening  before  my  steps  of  the  gates  of 
the  Eternal  World." 


INDEX. 


Abolition  Riots,  96. 

Adams,  Charles  Francis,  202,  274,  275,  276. 

Adams,  John  Quincy,  16,  187,  188. 

Agassiz,  Professor,  358. 

Aiken,  William,  223. 

"American,  The,"  79. 

"  American  Conflict,  The,"  139-142. 

American  Institute,  The,  attended  by  Greeley  on  the  occa- 
sion of  a  Tariff  Convention,  59  ;  Greeley  President  of, 
thirty-four  years  later,  60. 

Amherst,  Greeley's  birthplace,  23. 

Andrew,  Governor,  259. 

Ann  Street  Fire,  67. 

Atchison,  Senator,  214. 

Ayer,  J.  C,  99. 

"Bank-Note  Reporter,"  61,  63. 

Banks,  N.  P.,  218,  219,  223. 

Barnum,  P.  T.,  135,  320,  325,  354. 

Barnum,  Caroline,  354. 

Bates,  Edward,  227,  228. 

Beecher,  Henry  Ward,  132,  168,  296,  313,  324. 

Bell,  John,  231,  232. 

Benedict,  Lewis,  engages  Greeley  as  Editor  of  "  The  Jeffer- 

sonian,"  70. 
Benjamin,  Park,  329. 

Bennett,  James  Gordon,  11,  12,  93,  loi,  129-131. 
Bigelow,  John,  119. 


386  INDEX. 

Bliss,  Amos,  41. 

Blunt,  Joseph,  137. 

Bonner,  Mr.,  145. 

Booth,  Wilkes,  252. 

Bossange,  M,  Hector,  316. 

Botts,  John  M.,  279. 

Brady,  his  photograph  of  Greeley,  345. 

Breckinridge,  John  C,  231,  232. 

Bright,  John,  108,  142,  151. 

Brisbane,  Albert,  178,  182. 

"  Brook  Farm,"  182,  333. 

Brooks,  James,  93,  279. 

Brown,  B.  Gratz,  274,  276,  290. 

Browne,  Junius  Henri,  329. 

Brownson,  O.  A.,  182. 

Bruce,  George,  62. 

Bryant,  William  Cullen,  iig. 

Buchanan,  James,  224,  225,  347. 

Bungay,  George  W\,  329. 

Bush,  George,  "  Notes  on  Genesis,"  58. 

Butler,  A.  P.,  210. 

Cabinet,  Ritchie,  ii. 

Cable,  Laying  of  Atlantic,  14. 

Cady,  Daniel,  90. 

Calhoun,  John  C,  16,  172,  196,  210,  279. 

Cameron,  Simon,  228. 

Campbell,  Lewis  D.,  218. 

Cary,  Alice  and  Phoebe,  327-328. 

Cass,  General  Lewis,  201-204. 

Channing,  W.  H.,  182. 

Chapin,  Dr.  E.   H.,   133  ;  conducts  Greeley's  Funeral,  296  ; 

friendship  for  Greeley,  324,  365,  366. 
Chase,  S.  P.,  210,  228. 
Cheny,  Mary  Y.,  68. 

"Christian  Messenger,  The,"  Office  of,  325. 
Cilley,  Mr.,  71. 


INDEX.  387 

Civil  War,  239-270  ;  rapid  strides,  239-240. 

Clark,  Myron  H.,  216. 

Clay,  Henry,    16-17,  72,   104,    172,  1S7,    188.    192,   194,   ig(>- 

201,  209,  212,  339. 
Clayton,  J.  M.,  279. 
Clemens,  Ex-Senator,  235. 
Cobb,  Howell,  279. 
Cobden,  Richard,  127,  315. 
Coggeshall,  Mr.,  77. 
Collamer,  Jacob,  228,  279. 
Colonization  Movement,  19. 
"  Commercial  Advertiser,  The,"  60,  79,  90. 
Conger,  A.  B.,  91. 
"  Constitutionalist,  The,"  63. 
Cooper,  J.  Fenimore,  libel  suits,  88-92. 

"  Courier  and  Enquirer,  The,"  10,  12,  79,  90,  94-97,  200,337. 
Cranch,  C.  P.,  182. 
Crawford,  Mr.,  16,  187. 
"  Crittenden  Compromise  "  232. 
Cumming,  Amos,  329. 
Curtin,  Ex-Governor,  274. 
Curtis,  George  William,  182. 
Cuyler,  T.  L.,  143. 

Dana,  Charles  A.,  98,  103,  114,  182,  217,  323,  324,  329,  330, 

332-334.  338,  379- 
Davis,  Judge  David,  274,  276. 

Davis,  Jefferson,  210  ;  bailed  by  Greeley,  260-265. 
Dayton,  W.  L.,  228. 
Democratic  Party,  11,  16,  77,  189,  190;  Free-Soil  sentiment, 

196  ;  strong  nomination,  224  ;  Greeley  takes  them  at  their 

word,  276. 
Dickens,  Charles,  65,  364. 
Douglas,  Stephen  A.,  214,  225-227,  231,  232. 
Dwight,  John  S.,  1S2. 

"Enquirer,  Richmond,  The,"  it. 


388  INDEX. 

"  Erie  Gazette,  The,"  47. 

Evarts,  William  M.,  277. 

"  Evening  Journal,  The  Albany,"  6g,  90. 

"  Evening  Post,  The  New  York,"  60,  79. 

Everett,  Edward,  231. 

"  Express,  The  New  York,"  79. 

Federal  Party,  15,  69. 

Fern,  Fanny,  330. 

Field,  Maunsell  B.,  316. 

Fillmore,  Millard,  203,  210-212. 

Foster,  G.  G.,  329. 

Fourierism,  97,  98,  161,  176-185. 

Franklin,  Benjamin,  99,  190,  368,  380. 

Free-Soil  Cause,  162,  213-223. 

Fremont,  Colonel  John  C,  224. 

Fry,  William  H.,  324,  329,  332. 

Fuller,  Margaret,  connected  with  Brook  Farm,  182  ;  her 
description  of  Greeley's  home  at  Turtle  Bay,  300-301  ;  on 
Greeley's  housekeeping,  304-305  ;  Greeley's  praise  of, 
324  ;  Greeley's  relations  with,  325-327  ;  connected  with 
"  Tribune,"  330. 

Fuller,  Mr.,  218. 

Garrison,  William  Lloyd,  18. 

Gay,  Sidney  Howard,  329,  330. 

Gibson,  Sir  Milner,  127. 

Giddings,  Joshua  R.,  283. 

Gladstone,  William  E.,  137. 

"Globe,  The,"  11. 

Godwin,  Parke,  137,  182. 

Gough,  John  B.,  132,  169,   173. 

Graham,  Sylvester,  172-173. 

Grant,  General,  Greeley's   opposition   to  his  renomination, 

273  ;  election,  294. 
Graves,  Mr.,  71. 
Greeley,  Horace,  extent  of  public  career,  9  ;  first  journalis- 


INDEX.  389 

tic  venture,  9  ;  state  of  country  when  he  began  his  career, 
12-14 ;  circumstances  which  effected  his  development, 
14-15  ;  dSut,  15  ;  a  Whig  on  account  of  training,  17  ; 
prophetic  eye,  20  ;  Scotch-Irish  stock  settle  at  London- 
derry, N.  H.,  22  ;  born  at  Amherst,  23  ;  successful  char- 
acteristics inherited  from  his  mother,  25  ;  early  education 
from  his  mother,  26  ;  a  precocious  child,  26,  27  ;  sent  to 
school  at  three,  27,  28  ;  appearance  then,  28  ;  spelling  his 
forte,  28,  29  ;  declaiming,  29  ;  fondness  for  reading,  espe- 
cially the  newspaper,  30-31  ;  gentle,  but  fond  of  fun, 
31-32  ;  goes  to  Bedford  school,  32  ;  assistance  from  a 
clergyman,  33  ;  testimony  of  a  minister,  34  ;  moves  to 
Westhaven,  Vt.,  35  ;  picture  of  their  poverty,  35-36  ; 
leaves  study  for  farm  work,  36  ;  Flea  Knoll,  37  ;  his  dress 
at  this  period,  39  ;  decides  to  be  a  printer  at  the  age  of 
six,  40  ;  becomes  printer's  apprentice,  40-43  ;  debating 
society,  43-44  ;  again  seeks  his  fortune,  44-47  ;  "  Erie 
Gazette,"  47  ;  "  The  Commercial  Emporium,"  51,  53  ;  un- 
gainly appearance,  53,  54 ;  in  search  of  employment, 
55-57;  John  T.  West's,  57  ;  "Spirit  of  the  Times."  59; 
Tariff  Convention,  59 ;  disheartening  experiences,  60 ; 
end  of  'prentice  days,  61  ;  "  Greeley  &  Story,"  61-63  ; 
"  Morning  Post"  established,  62  ;  "  New  Yorker"  estab- 
lished, 64  ;  horror  of  debt,  66-67  '■>  marriage,  68  ;  editor 
of  "  The  Jeffersonian,"  69-72  ;  campaign  of  1840,  72  ; 
"The  Log  Cabin,"  72-75  ;  becomes  editor  of  "  The  Trib- 
une," 77-81  ;  dispute  with  "  Herald,"  83-87  ;  libel  suits 
with  J.  F.  Cooper,  88-92  ;  involved  in  an  internecine  war 
of  the  press,  93-98  ;  made  "Tribune"  a  joint-stock  con- 
cern, 98-99  ;  issue  of  almanac,  99  ;  "  Slievegammon," 
100,  loi  ;  in  "  Tribune"  office,  104-105  ;  debt  of  "  Tribune" 
to,  106-110  ;  essentially  a  publicist  and  editor,  111-114  ;  a 
fearfully  overtasked  man,  115  ;  special  forte,  116-118  ; 
style,  118-119  ;  less  amiable  traits,  119-121  ;  handwriting, 
122-123  ;  views  of  journalism,  123-129  ;  represented  an 
era  in  journalism,  129-131  ;  lyceum  lecturer,  132-134  ; 
political  and   campaign   speaking,    136-138  ;    authorship. 


390  INDEX. 

138-143  ;  poetry,  143-145  ;  literature,  145-147  ;  character 
as  a  reformer,  148-154  ;  lecture,  154  ;  a  clew  to  his  habits, 
I55~^56  ;  pl^^  fo'"  socialism,  156-159  ;  sketches  of  typical 
reformers,  159-161  ;  attitude  toward  the  Slavery  Question, 
162-165  ;  his  total  abstinence,  166-169  ;  capital  punish- 
ment, 169-170;  opposition  to  war,  170-171  ;  political  re- 
form, 171-172  ;  a  vegetarian,  172-173  ;  connection  with 
spiritualism,  173-174  ;  on  marriage  and  divorce,  174-176  ; 
Fourierisra,  176-185  ;  natural  bent  for  politics,  186  ;  first 
campaign,  187  ;  important  era  in  his  life,  189  ;  as  a  Whig, 
190-204  ;  enthusiasm  for  Henry  Clay,  197-198  ;  supports 
Taylor,  201-203  I  gathering  up  of  "  strands,"  205-213  ; 
numbered  with  moderates,  210;  Tariff  Question,  211; 
last  conversation  with  Clay,  213  ;  Free-Soil  struggle, 
213-223  ;  new  era  before  him,  213-217  ;  writes  to  Seward, 
217  ;  at  the  reporter's  desk,  218  ;  attacked  by  Rust,  219- 
222  ;  breaks  with  Seward,  227  ;  arraigned  for  inconsist- 
ency, 230-231  ;  stand  in  regard  to  South  in  i860,  233- 
238  ;  criticisms  on  war,  240-246 ;  his  weakness,  244 ; 
correspondence  with  Jewett,  246-250 ;  failed  to  under- 
stand Lincoln,  251  ,  his  opinion  of  Lincoln,  251-254;  in- 
defatigable efforts,  254-255  ;  charges  against  him,  255- 
256  ;  mobbed,  256,  257  ;  his  course  in  work  of  recon- 
struction, 258-260  ;  bailing  of  Jefferson  Davis,  260-265  J 
personal  independence,  265-270  ;  an  independent  Repub- 
lican, 272-273  ;  opposition  to  renomination  of  Grant, 
273  ;  nomination  for  Presidency,  274-277  ;  previously  a 
candidate  several  times  for  political  office,  277-2S4  ;  craved 
popular  recognition,  284-288  ;  James  S.  Pike's  view  of 
him  at  this  time,  288-289  ;  the  first  candidate  for  Presi- 
dency that  took  the  stump,  291-293  ;  defeat,  294  ;  death 
of  wife,  and  his  own  death,  295-296 ;  funeral,  296- 
297  ;  moved  from  city  to  Turtle  Bay,  300 ;  home  at 
Chappaqua,  301-303  ;  housekeeping  in  *'  Castle  Rack- 
rent"  style,  304-305  ;  outings,  306-307  ;  to  home  of  par- 
ents, 308  ;  to  Lake  Superior,  309  ;  to  California,  309- 
313;  first  visit   to   Europe,  313-315  ;  to  Europe  in   1S55. 


INDEX.  391 

315-318  ;  imprisonment  in  Paris,  316-317  ;  acquaintances 
and  friends,  319-328  ;  co-laborers,  328-338  ;  two  political 
loves,  338-343  ;  his  general  appearance,  344-348  ;  dress, 
348-352  ;  manners,  352-357  ;  economy,  357-359  ;  "loans," 
359,  361  ;  industry,  361-362  ;  ideas  of  recreation,  362-363  ; 
taste  for  the  drama,  364  ;  vegetarian  habits,  etc.,  364-365  ; 
Sabbath  and  church  observance,  364,  366  ;  intellectually 
considered,  368-371  ;  clew  to  inconsistencies,  371,  376  ; 
strange  personality,  371-372  ;  place  in  history,  372-373  ; 
non-combatancy,  374-375  ;  private  life,  375  ;  egoist  and 
altruist,  377  ;  editor  everywhere,  377,  378  ;  •"  a  man  of 
earnest  principle,"  378-380  ;  not  a  failure,  381. 

Greeley,  Mrs.,  295,  298,  299,  301,  303,  304-306,  311,  316, 
326. 

Greeley,  "  Pickie,"  305-306,  311,  316,  327. 

Greeley,  Zaccheus,  great-grandfather,  23. 

Greeley,  Zaccheus,  grandfather,  23, 

Greeley,  Zaccheus,  father,  23,  24  ;  affairs  reach  a  crisis,  35  ; 
leaves  Westhaven  and  settles  in  Wayne,  45. 

"  Greeley  &  Co.,"  64,  130. 

"Greeley  &  Story,"  63. 

Gregory,  Dudley  S.,  63,  77. 

Hale,  David,  56,  210. 

Hall,  J.  Prescott,  200. 

Hall,  Willis,  79. 

Harris,  Judge  Ira,  277,  278. 

Harrison,  General  William  Henry,  72,  74,  75  ;  dying  words 
of,  79  ;  candidate,  191  ;  Seward  and  Weed  urge  renomi- 
nation,  192  ;   "Tippecanoe"  elected,  193  ;  death,  194. 

Hassard,  J.  R.  S.,  329,  330. 

Hawks,  Dr.,  93. 

Hawthorne,  Nathaniel,  182. 

Hay,  Colonel  John,   329. 

*'  Herald,  The  New  York,"  10,  12,  76,  79  ;  disputed  with 
"  Tribune"  about  comparative  circulation,  83-87  ;   130. 

Hildreth,  R.  H.,  329. 


392  INDEX. 

Homes,  Greeley's,  at  Londonderry,  22  ;  at  Turtle  Bay,  299- 

300  ;  in  New  York,  299  ;  at  Chappaqua,  301-303. 
Houston,  "  Sam,"  19,  196,  208. 
Howard,  Joseph,  329,  330. 
Howe,  Julia  Ward,  171. 
Hoyt,  Jesse,  12. 
Hunt,  Holman,  315. 

Jackson,  General,  16-17,  189,  190,  209. 

"  Jeffersonian,  The,"  70-72,  76,  193. 

Jenks,  Mr.,  171. 

Jewett,  W.  C,  245-246. 

Johnson,  Andrew,  259,  260,  280. 

Johnston,  Albert  Sidney,  312. 

Jones,  George  W.,  280. 

Jordan,  Ambrose  L.,  90. 

"Journal  of  Commerce,  The,"  10,  56,  79,  85. 

Journalism,  First  break  in  traditional,  9  ;  development,  10  ; 
a  new  step — the  publication  of  a  literary  weekly,  64  ;  a 
type  of  journalistic  ambition,  loo-ioi  ;  "  Tribune's"  place 
in,  109  ;  Greeley's  views  of,  123-129  ;  Greeley  represented 
an  era  in,  129-131  ;  office-holding  and,  286  ;  testimony 
given  by  Greeley  in  England  on  American,  315  ;  Raymond 
the  most  versatile  journalist  connected  with  New  York 
press,  336;  journalists  connected  with  "  Tribune,"  329- 
338  ;  "Tribune"  one  of  greatest  journalistic  powers  of  the 
land,  381. 

Judkins,  Captain  of  steamship  "  Cambria,"  86. 

"Junta,  The  Richmond,"  11. 

Know- Nothing  Party,  212-213,  218. 
Kossuth,  Louis,  332-333. 

Lee,  General,  259,  261. 

Lincoln,  Abraham,  champion  of  Free-Soil  cause,  226-227  ; 

elected,  228-232  ;  war  going  on  before  inauguration,  239  ; 

call  to  arms,  240  ;  reply  to  Greeley's  "prayer  of  twenty 


INDEX.  393 

millions,"  243,  244  ;  commission  to  Greeley,  246-250  ;  his 
well-known  story,  251  ;  Greeley's  criticisms  and  opinion 
of,  251-254;  death,  259,  261-262  ;  assassination  referred 
to  in  a  speech  of  Greeley,  265  ;  among  Whigs,  280. 

"Log  Cabin,  The."  72-78,  82,  193. 

Lovejoy,  Elijah  P.,  208,  209. 

Lovejoy,  Owen,  19. 

Lundy,  Benjamin,  18. 

Lyceum  lecture.  Era  of,  132-133. 

Mackenzie's  publication  of  a  famous  correspondence,  11. 

Mann,  Horace,  279. 

Marcy,  William  L  ,  71,  191,  193,  209. 

Marsh,  George  P.,  279. 

Mason,  John  Y.,  316. 

Maxwell,  Hugh,  200. 

McClellan,  General,  242. 

McElrath,  Thomas,  partner  of  Greeley,  80,  98-99,  322,  328- 

329. 
"  McElrath  &  Bangs."  57. 
McLean,  Judge,  224,  22S. 
Mileage,  281-282. 
Millais,  J.  E.,  315. 
Missouri  Compromise,  18. 
Monroe,  James,  15. 
"  Morning  Post,  The,"  10,  62-63,  79' 
Morris,  Robert  H.,  79. 
Morse,  S.  F.  B.,  14. 

"New  American  Cyclopaedia,  The,"  edited  by  Dana  and 
Ripley,  333. 

"  Newton  &  Case,"  "  American  Conflict"  written  at  the  so- 
licitation of,  139. 

New  York,  when  Greeley  first  saw  it,  54,  55. 

"  New  Yorker,  The,"  64-69,  74,  76,  77,  82,  89,  206,  335. 

Noah,  Major  M.  M.,  93,  119. 

NordhofT,  Charles,  329. 


394  INDEX, 

"  North  American  Phalanx,"  182. 
"Northern  Spectator,  The."  40-44,  61,  187. 

Ottarson,  F.  J.,  103,  329,  330. 
Owen,  Robert  Dale,  175,  179. 

Palfrey,  John  G.,  279. 

Parker,  Theodore,  133. 

Parton,  James,   3,   31,   39,   103,    104,  144,  317,  329-332,  352, 

353- 
Pellet,  Sarah,  168. 
Pennington,  Mr  ,  218. 
"  Pennsylvanian,  The,"  11. 
Piatt,  Don,  316, 
Piatt,  Mrs.,  316. 
Pierce,  President,  215. 
Pike,  James  S.,  103,  288,  323,  329. 
Poe,  Edgar  A.,  story  of  his  autograph,  360. 
Polk,  James  K.,  196,  198. 
Porter,  William  T.,  59. 
Potts,  Dr.,  93. 

Poultney,  East,  Vt.,  40,  43,  187,  189,  205,  355. 
Press,    The  American,  establishment  of  independent,   10  ; 

cause  of  success,  12  ;  Club,  65  ;  internecine  war,  93-98  ; 

information  given  by  Greeley  about   it   in  England,  127- 

129,  315  ;  Henry  J.  Raymond  on  office-holding  and,  287  ; 

George  Ripley,  "  father  of  literary  criticism"  in,  330-331  ; 

Thurlow  Weed  the  most  pungent  writer  on,  342. 
Protection  tariff.  Debate  on,  137. 
"Putnam's  Monthly,"  Description  of  Greeley  in,  53. 

Randolph,  Ex-Governor,  Estimate  of  Greeley,  292. 

Railroads,  Opening  of,  13. 

Raymond,  Henry  J.,  Greeley's  assistant,  80  ;  feat  in  short- 
hand, 85  ;  discussion  with  Greeley,  183  ;  lieutenant-gov- 
ernor, 216;  a  letter  to  "The  Times,"  229-230;  on  the 
press  and  office-holding,  2S7  ;  rival  spirit,  323  ;  employed 


INDEX.  395 

on  "  The  Tribune,"  329  ;  the  most  versatile  journalist, 
330  ;  assists  Greeley  on  "  The  New  Yorker"  and  afterward 
on  "  The  Tribune,"  335  ;  Greeley's  best  assistant,  336  ;  em- 
ployed on  "  The  Courier  and  Enquirer,"  337  ;  becomes 
Greeley's  rival,  337,  338, 
"  Recollections  of  a  Busy  Life,"  3,  180,  251,  303,   305,  325, 

335.  345. 
Reconstruction  period,  258-270. 

Redfield,  J.  S.,  59. 

Regency,  Albany,  11,  188. 

Republican  Party,  Greeley  as  a  Republican,  162  ;  organiza- 
tion of,  216,  223  ;  Greeley's  belief  concerning,  267  ;  rise 
of  independents  in,  271  ;  Greeley  an  independent  Repub- 
lican, 272  ;  power  over  masses  of  people,  294  ;  in  Gree- 
ley's debt,  370. 

Richardson,  Albert,  218,  329-330. 

Reid,  Whitelaw,  Greeley's  enthusiastic  praise  of,  324  ;  em- 
ployed on  "Tribune,"  329;  managing  editor  of  "Trib- 
une," 330. 

Ripley,  George,  98,   103,   116,   118,    182,    322-324,    329-331. 

333.  371- 
Ritchie,  his  photograph  "of  Greeley,  345. 
Robinson,  Solon,  103,  329,  330. 
Ruskin,  John,  317. 
Rust,  Albert,  218-222. 

Sawyer,  Dr.,  365. 

Saxe,  John  G.,  133. 

Schenck,  General  Robert  C.,  279. 

Schurz,  Carl,"  273. 

Scott,  General,  210-212. 

Seward,  William   H.,  69-71,   90,    91,   96,  191-194,  210,  216- 

217,  227-231,  278,  284,  287,  288,  339-343. 
"  Seward.  Weed  &  Greeley,"  70,  339. 
Shepard   D.  H.,  61-62,   79. 
Shepard,  Edward  M.,  192. 
Slave  Question,  17-20,  162-165,  195-196,  207-20^,  210-21 1. 


396  INDEX. 

Smalley,  George  W.,  329,  330. 
Smith,  Gerrit,  259. 
Smith,  Samuel  A.,  222. 
Snow,  George  M.,  80,  98,  103,  329. 
Spaulding,  Judge,  259. 
Spencer,  Joshua  A.,  90. 

"  Spirit  of  the  Times,"  sporting  paper,  59,  61. 
Spiritualism,  173-174. 
Stephens,  Alexander  H.,  259,  279. 
Sterrett,  Mr.,  47,  48,  50. 
Stevens,  Thaddeus,  266,  271. 

"Stewart  Farm,"  at  Amherst,  Greeley's  birthplace,  24. 
Story,  Francis  V.,  61,  64. 
Sumner,  Charles,  222. 

"Sun,  The  New  York,"  10,  12,  76,  79,  81,  85,  127  ;  appre- 
ciative notices  after  Greeley's  death,  334,  379. 

Talmage,  T.  De  Witt,  132. 

Taylor,  Bayard,  103,  133,  323,  331-332. 

Taylor,  Zachary,  199-201,  203,  279. 

Telegraph,  The  era  of  the,  14. 

Thayer,  Eli,  225. 

Thompson,  Jacob,  279-2S0. 

Tilden,  Samuel  J.,  137. 

Tilton.  Theodore,  329. 

"  Times,  The  New  York,"  10,  80,  153-154. 

"Tippecanoe  and  Tyler  too,"  73-74. 

Toombs,  Robert,  279. 

"Tribune,  The  New  York,"  10,  65  ;  half  Greeley's  life  de- 
voted to,  76  ;  started,  77-80  ;  conspiracy  to  crush  it,  Si- 
82  ;  "  New  Yorker"  and  "  Log  Cabin"  merged  into  weekly 
edition,  82  ;  increase  in  circulation,  82,  83  ;  dispute  with 
"  Herald"  about  comparative  circulation,  83-87  ;  riot  of 
Mike  Walsh  and  his  "  Spartan  Band,"  87,  88  ;  libel  suits 
with  J.  F.  Cooper,  8S-92  ;  internecine  war  on  the  part  of  the 
press,  93-98  ;  a  joint  stock  concern,  98  ;  a  triumph  scored, 
101  ;  burning  of  "  Tribune"  building,  102  ;  interior  view  of 


i 


INDEX.  397 

-Tribune"  building,  103  ;  in  its  thirtieth  year.  106  ;  quality 
of  "Tribune- under  Greeley,  106-110  ;  John  Bright's  opin- 
ion of,  108,  109;  Almanac,  117  I  views  concerning  Fou- 
rierism.  181-184  ;  helped  carry  anti-slavery  Whigs  over  to 
Taylor,'  203  ;   Greeley's  watch  of,  217  ;   Greeley's  corre- 
spondence in,  219  ;  Greeley's  opinions  about  the  Union  in, 
236  237  ;  Greeley's  criticisms  on  War  in,  240-246  ;  corre- 
spondents during  War,  254  I  held  up  to  popular  execration, 
255,  256  :  mobbed,   256,  257  ;  Greeley's  flag  over  office, 
260  ;   loss  of   subscribers  on  Greeley's    bailing  Jefferson 
Davis,  262  ;  ceased  to  be  a  party  organ,  293  ;  journalists 
connected  with,   329-338  I  in  the  editorial  office  in  1867, 
334  ;    Raymond  assistant  editor,  335  ;  Greeley's  tireless 
industry  in  the  office.  346,  347  ;  Greeley  against  declaring 
dividends,  35S  ;  one  of  the  greatest  journalistic  powers  in 
the  land.  381. 

Trumbull,  Lyman,  274-276,  290. 

Twiggs,  General,  239. 

Tyler,  John.  83,  194-196,  198- 

Union  League  Club,  261,  268. 

Van  Buren.  Martin,  16,  69.  74,  189.   IQI  ;  (life  in  American 

Statesman  Series).  192  ;  196,  202,  203,  347- 
Vanderbilt,  Commodore,  87. 
Vattemare,  M.,  316. 

Walsh,  Mike,  and  his  "  Spartan  Band,"  87,  88. 

Ward,  "  Bloody  Sixth,"  87,  88. 

Washburne,  E.  B.,  316. 

Washington,  George.  15,  347- 

Webb,  Colonel  James  Watson,  93,  95. 

Webster,  Daniel,  85,  I95,  210-212,  279,  287. 

Weed.  Thurlow,  69  ;  engages  Greeley  as  editor  of  "  The  Jef- 
fersonian,"  70;  induces  Greeley  to  vote  for  Harrison  in- 
stead of  Clay,  72  ;  letter  from  Greeley.  73  I  letter  from, 
90-  letter  from  Greeley,  116  ;  on  Greeley's  Fouriensm, 


39^  INDEX. 

1S4  ;  Greeley  follows  his  lead,  192  ;  the  Warwick  of  Re- 
publican politics,  277  ;  represented  Greeley  as  a  persist- 
ent office-seeker,  284  ;  cause  of  alienation  between  Gree- 
ley and  himself,  288  ;  reply  to  Greeley's  demand,  340  ; 
description  of,  342  ;  a  possible  cause  of  apparent  neglect 
of  Greeley,  247,  248. 

Wentworth,  John,  279,  282 

West,  John  T.,  57-59- 

Westhaven,  Vt.,  35. 

Whig  Party,  16-17,  19*;  revival,  69;  "The  Jefifersonian" 
contributes  to  success  of,  71  ;  war-cry  of  1S40,  72  ;  felt 
the  need  of  an  organ,  77,  78  ;  "'  Tribune"  started,  79  ;  Al- 
manac, 99  ;  Greeley  a  Whig,  162  ;  organization,  190  ;  can- 
didate, William  H.  Harrison,  191  ;  nomination  of  1640, 
192  ;  unfitness  for  practical  politics,  194  ;  nominates  Henry 
Clay,  198  ;  chapter  on  Greeley  as  a  Whig,  186-204  >  Gree- 
ley clings  to  party,   2og  ;  dead,    212  ;  in   Greeley's  debt, 

370- 
White,  Horace,  273. 
White,  Hugh  L.,  191. 
White,  Zebulon,  329,  330. 
Whittlesey,  Elisha,  172. 
Willis,  X.  P..  146. 
Winchester,  Jonas,  64. 
Winter,  William,  329,  330. 
Winthrop,  Robert  C,  279. 
Wirt,  William,  144,  188,  189,  339. 

Woodburn,  John,  Greeley's  maternal  grandfather,  22,  27. 
Woodburn,   Mary,   Greeley's  mother,  23  ;  character  of,  25- 

26  ;  her  influence  w-ith  Greeley,  45. 
Wordsworth,  William,  Saying  of,  32. 
Wright,  Silas,  196. 

Young,  John  Russell,  329,  330. 


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